f^pp     ft^  lOlG 


BM  4T~:M44~T9I8~    ' 

Melamed,  Samuel  Max,  1885- 

1938. 
On  the  eve  of  redemption 


'*^ 


APR  5  im 


On  the  Eve 

of  Redemption 


S.  M.  Melameil,  Ph.  D. 


Alpha  Omega  Publishing  Gjmpany, 
New  York 


Copyright,  1918 
Alpha  Omega  Publishing  Co.,  Inc. 


The  following  pages  comprise  a 
number  of  editorial  leaders  discuss- 
ing questions  and  problems  per- 
taining to  Jewish  nationalism  and 
Zionism  which  were  published  in  the 
American  Jewish  Chronicle  in  the 
years  1916-17-18. 


Wl 


FOREWORD 

THE  war  has  caused  an  upheaval  of  the 
whole  world;  vast  changes  have  been 
wrought  in  many  peoples.  Destruction  of 
life  and  treasure  has  brought  about  a  revolu- 
tion of  national  assets  and  resources,  and 
there  has  been  stock  taking  of  the  spiritual  no 
less  than  of  the  material  possessions.  We 
have  confident  hope  that  the  material  losses 
will  be  balanced  by  the  moral  progress  of  the 
peoples  of  the  world,  great  and  small. 

No  people  has  felt  the  upheaval  more  than 
have  the  Jews.  None  has  had  a  greater  share 
in  its  sorrows.  None  has  had  more  reason  to 
examine  carefully  its  past  and  its  present  and 
to  define  its  future  plans ;  and  none  can  look 
with  clearer  purpose  or  with  firmer  courage 
into  the  future.  For  none  has  better  ground 
than  have  the  Jews  for  confident  hope  in  the 
moral  progress  of  the  world, — that  people 
which  has  been  the  constant  witness  of  the 
course    of    civilization    throughout   the   ages 


IV 


and  has  never  lost  its  faith  in  the  ultimate 
victory  of  Justice  and  Eight. 

We  need  not  speak  in  generalities.  The 
smaller  nations  are  assured  that  their  rights 
will  be  safeguarded  in  the  future,  and  that 
these  rights  will  embrace  not  only  protection 
from  attack  and  aggression,  but  equally  the 
right  of  development  along  the  lines  of  their 
own  national  bent,  the  right  of  self-govern- 
ment, the  right  to  cultivate  their  own 
spiritual  possessions.  There  is  no  other  people 
to  whom  this  is  so  full  of  deep  meaning  as 
to  the  Jews.  During  the  many  centuries  of 
the  Dispersion  our  people  has  ever  looked  for- 
ward to  its  Kestoration  in  its  ancestral  home. 
During  these  many  centuries  there  has  never 
been  a  day  that  the  prayers  for  the  Return 
have  not  ascended  in  every  country  of  the 
world  in  which  the  Children  of  Israel  have 
been  dispersed.  This  undying  hope  has  been 
the  factor  in  the  unique,  the  miraculous  pre- 
servation of  a  small  people  scattered  among 
all  the  peoples  of  the  globe. 

The  national  movement  of  the  past  genera- 
tion, which  has  led  to  the  rejuvenation  of  the 
Hebrew  language,  to  the  founding  of  prosper- 
ous   Jewish    colonies    in    Palestine,    to    the 


establishment  of  the  Zionist  Organization 
with  its  branches  throughout  the  world,  this 
national  movement  has  trained  us  to  think 
politically  and  to  act  with  statesmanlike 
grasp  of  present  conditions  and  of  plans  for 
the  future.  A  part  of  our  people  has  been 
prepared  to  deal  with  the  great  national  pro- 
blems which  obtrude  themselves  upon  us  to- 
day. Large  numbers  are  still  confused  by  the 
new  outlook  and  must  find  guides  to  direct 
them  in  the  new  paths. 

The  Essays  which  Dr.  Melamed  presents  to 
us  in  this  volume  are  therefore  most  welcome 
at  this  time.  He  has  applied  his  vast  knowl- 
edge of  history,  philosophy  and  literature,  and 
his  intimate  acquaintance  with  Jewish  life  in 
many  parts  of  the  world,  to  answer  many  of 
the  questions  about  which  there  has  been 
confusion,  and  to  point  out  the  direction  of 
progress  and  development  in  the  future.  In 
clear  and  forceful  language  he  has  analyzed 
Jewish  conditions  in  the  past  and  studied  the 
needs  of  the  future,  so  as  to  point  out  what 
the  present  demands  of  us.  We  may  not 
agree  fully  with  all  the  views  and  conclusions 
expressed,  but  we  shall  find  them  original, 
suggestive  and  illuminating.    The  publication 


VI 


of  these  Essays  is  therefore  opportune  and 
timely,  and  the  Jewish  public  is  deeply  in- 
debted to  Dr.  Melamed  for  their  presentation. 

Harry  Friedenwald. 

Baltimore, 

December  23,  1917. 


JUDEA  AND  ROME 

EVEN  history  has  its  reasons  that  reason 
often  fails  to  understand.  When  news 
reached  Rome  in  August  70  C.E.  that  Judea  was 
conquered,  the  temple  burned  and  the  Jewish 
people  subjugated,  the  Roman  populace  greeted 
it  with  the  infamous  cry,  "Hierosolyma  est 
perdita'';  there  was  rejoicing  at  the  downfall 
and  humiliation  of  the  Jewish  state.  Eighteen 
hundred  and  forty-seven  years  later,  after  the 
deafening  cries  "Hierosolyma  est  perdita" 
were  shouted  in  the  streets  of  the  eternal  city, 
an  Italian  army  leaves  Rome  with  Palestine 
again  as  its  objective;  but  this  time  it  marches 
not  with  the  object  of  annihilating  Judea,  but, 
as  an  official  message  puts  it — to  enable  the 
allied  powers  to  wrest  the  Holy  Land  from  the 
Turks,  to  turn  it  over  eventually  to  the  Jews, 
and  thus  to  rebuild  Judea.  Even  if  there 
should  be  little  to  the  Roman  announcement, 
it  is  not  lacking  a  pathetic  touch ;  it  testifies  to 
the  grim  irony  of  history.  The  same  Rome  that 
once  destroyed  Judea  is  making  public  its  in- 


tention   today   to   lielp   rebuild  it.     Our  an- 
cestors, wlio  were  the  tragic  witnesses  of  the 
cruel  destruction  of  Judea,  would  surely  not 
think  of  the  possibility  that  after  a  lapse  of 
nearly  two  thousand  years,  an  army  should 
leave  Rome  for  Palestine  with  the  object  of 
helping  to  reinstate  the  Jewish  people  in  the 
land  of  its  forefathers ;  nor  could  anyone  have 
foreseen  that  the  Rome  of  old,  that  aimed  at 
the  subjugation  of  small  nationalities,  would 
be  succeeded  by  a  new  Rome  that  pronounces 
its  stand  for  the  rights  and  political  re-estab- 
lishment of  small  and  oppressed  nationalities. 
Of  course,  people  Avill  say  that  modern  Rome 
can  in  no  way  be  compared  to  ancient  Rome 
and  that  the  two  have  nothing  in  common. 
However,  those  who  have  read  Montesquieu 
and  Hegel  on  the  deeds  of  ancient  Rome  and 
those  who  have  followed  the  development  of 
modern  Rome,  will  recognize  the  close  simil- 
arity between  the  two.     As  far  as  power  and 
political    and    stragetic    genius    go,    modern 
Rome,  it  is  true,  cannot  be  compared  to  its 
predecessor  of  two  thousand  j-ears  ago ;  but  if 
traditions,  surroundings  and  other  sociological 
factors  that  give  a   people   shape  and   form 
count  for  anything,   the  Roman  of  today  is 


bound  to  have  a  good  deal  in  common  with  the 
Roman  of  two  thousand  years  ago,  even  if  the 
one  is  not  racially  the  offspring  of  the  other. 

Present-day   Rome   has   much   in    common 
with    ancient    Rome.      The    main    difference 
between  them  is,  of  course,  this :  While  ancient 
Rome,  dominating  the  entire  world  then  known 
to  humanity,  and  forming  the  centre  of  the 
Mediterranean    civilization,    was    the    world 
power  of  the  time,  modern  Rome  holds  neither 
the  political  position  of  ancient  Rome  nor  is  it 
the  representative  and  bearer  of  the  Mediterra- 
nean civilization.  The  predominance  of  Mediter- 
ranean civilization  has  gone  with  the  last  great 
Doges   of  Venice,    and   modern   Rome   is   no 
longer  the  centre  of  gravitation  of  civilized 
humanity  that  ancient  Rome  was  two  thousand 
years  ago.  In  the  course  of  the  last  millenium, 
the  centre  of  civilization  has  shifted  from  the 
Mediterranean    to    the    Atlantic.      It    is    the 
Atlantic  civilization   that  is  supreme  today. 
The  whole  terrible  fight  that  is  going  on  today 
in  all  parts  of  the  world  is  not  a  fight  about  the 
Mediterranean  and  its  supremacy,  but  it  is  a 
struggle  for  the  Atlantic  and  its  predominance 
— and,  in  this  struggle,  Rome  is  no  longer 
playing  a  leading  part. 


In  the  course  of  the  fight  about  the  Medi- 
terranean, Judea  was  destroyed  and  the  whole 
Semitic  race  nearly  annihilated.  The  wars  of 
Rome  against  Carthage,  the  people  of  which 
spoke  Hebrew  and  formed  a  branch  of  the 
Aramaic  family  of  nations,  were  fought  with 
the  only  object  of  preserving  Roman  suprem- 
acy in  the  Mediterranean.  The  fight  for  the 
Atlantic,  however,  has  already  resulted  in  the 
re-establishment  of  one  Semitic  nation — the 
Arab — and  will  probably  also  result  in  the  re- 
establishment  of  old  Judea.  That  is  where 
the  difference  between  the  fight  for  the  Med- 
iterranean, fought  by  ancient  Rome,  and  the 
fight  for  the  Atlantic,  in  which  modern  Rome 
participates,  comes  in. 

The  ancient  Mediterranean  Rome  was  not 
only  imperialistic  to  the  core,  but  universal- 
istic  as  well.  The  chief  aim  and  plan  of 
ancient  Rome  was  to  subjugate  the  whole 
world,  then  known  to  humanity,  with  a  view  to 
dominating  it.  The  idea  of  a  uniA'Crsal  mon- 
archy at  the  expense  of  the  independence  and 
freedom  of  other  nations  first  originated  in 
ancient  Rome.  Rome  of  today,  which  takes  part 
in  the  fight  for  the  Atlantic,  is  imperialistic, 
although  no  longer  striving  for  political  uni- 


versalism  and  world  domination ;  it  announces 
that  it  stands  today  for  the  preservation  of 
the  individuality  of  the  small  nations. 

The  prospective  re-establishment  of  Judea, 
as  one  of  the  consequences  of  the  present  war, 
cannot  be  a  blind  chance  of  fate.  There  is 
historical  logic  in  this  development.  Palestine, 
as  a  Mediterranean  country  could  not  maintain 
its  independence  in  the  face  of  a  rising  Med- 
iterranean world  power  that  strove  to  master 
not  only  the  Mediterranean  but  all  the  other 
parts  of  the  globe  then  known  to  mankind. 
Our  sages  of  old  found  a  thousand  and  one 
moral  and  political  reasons  for  the  downfall  of 
ancient  Judea  and  for  its  destruction  by  Rome. 
They  ascribed  the  downfall  of  ancient  Judea 
not  only  to  political,  but  even  to  moral  causes 
and  to  the  growth  of  individual  hatred  and 
dissensions  among  the  Jews  themselves.  The 
internal  political  and  moral  reasons  advanced 
by  our  sages  for  the  downfall  of  Judea  may 
have  contributed  to  the  destruction,  but  the 
main  reason  was  the  determination  of  Eome  to 
master  all  the  shores  of  the  Mediterranean  and 
to  dominate  the  entire  ancient  world.  In  the 
face  of  this  fact,  even  an  internally  solid  and 
strong  Judea  would  have  finally  succumbed  as 


did  Carthage,  whicli  produced  greater  generals 
and  gave  a  better  military  account  of  itself 
than  did  Judea.  The  destruction  of  Judea  was 
a  tragic  historical  necessity  and  could  only 
have  been  avoided  if  Rome  had,  by  a  mir- 
acle, suddenly  disappeared  from  the  face  of 
the  earth.  Were  present  Rome  what  ancient 
Rome  was,  the  centre  of  civilization  that 
strove  for  the  mastery  not  only  of  the  Medi- 
terranean countries  but  also  of  the  entire 
world,  the  prospective  re-establishment  of 
Judea  today  would  have  as  little  chance  as 
ancient  Judea  of  surviving  or  resisting  Roman 
aggression.  The  prospective  re-establishment 
of  Judea  is  only  possible  because  the  centre  of 
civilization  has  been  shifted  from  the  Mediter- 
ranean to  the  Atlantic. 

Why  did  the  Jewish  people  suffer  two 
thousand  years  under  the  dispersion  and 
why  did  they  not  try  during  this  long  period 
to  re-establish  their  political  sovereignty  in  the 
land  of  their  ancestors?  Even  the  best  of  our 
thinkers  ascribe  this  national  default  and 
political  apathy  to  a  sort  of  lethargy  of  which 
the  Jews  were  apparently  the  victims.  To 
many  a  Jewish  thinker,  Ahad  Ha'am  not  ex- 
cepted, the  past  two  thousand  years  of  Jewish 


existence  appears  to  be  planless  and  one  great 
historic  confusion;  but  on  looking  closely  at 
developments,  one  will  come  to  recog- 
nize that  not  because  of  lethargy,  but  because 
of  given  historical  conditions,  the  Jewish 
people  could  not  up  to  our  times  have  at- 
tempted to  re-establish  their  national  sover- 
eignty in  the  land  of  their  forefathers.  More 
than  a  thousand  years  after  the  downfall  of 
western  Eome,  Mediterranean  civilization, 
though  degenerated,  remained  supreme  and 
was  identical  with  civilization  at  large.  The 
chief  move  of  its  centre  from  the  Mediter- 
ranean to  the  Atlantic  and  the  consolidation 
of  a  new  center  was  accomplished  only  after 
a  struggle  of  nearly  five  hundred  years.  So 
long  as  Atlantic  civilization  was  not  supreme 
and  so  long  as  the  fight  for  its  supremacy  was 
not  finished,  the  political  re-establishment  of 
Judea,  closely  connected  with  the  settlement 
of  the  solution  of  questions  arising  out  of  the 
fight  for  the  Atlantic  and  all  that  there  is  to 
it— the  individualization  of  international 
politics,  the  preservation  of  the  small  nation- 
alities, their  political  restoration,  etc. — 
could  not  be  taken  up  and  no  serious  attempt 
to  re-establish  the  Jewish  nationality  in  Pales- 


tine  could  be  made  by  the  Jews  or  other 
nations  interested  in  the  settlement  of  the 
Jewish  question. 

For  tliese  reasons,  the  re-establishment  of 
Judea,  as  one  of  the  post-bellum  problems,  is  as 
historically  logical  now  as  was  the  downfall  of 
Judea  a  historical  necessity  two  thousand 
years  ago. 

Thei^  are  no  blind  chances  in  history,  nor 
are  there  stagnant  moments  in  history.  His- 
tory has  its  reasons,  which,  however,  reason 
often  fails  to  understand. 


LAND  AND  PEOPLE 

EVER  since  the  Jewish  people  lost  its 
national  independence  and  sovereignty^ 
and  began  to  live  in  dispersion  among  the 
nations  of  the  earth,  it  has  lost  the  opportunity 
and  possibility  of  continuing  the  work  of  its 
national  civilization  and  has  had  to  be  satis- 
fied with  producing  cultural  values  only. 
Everything  that  individual  Jews  have  achieved 
in  the  past  two  thousand  years  in  the  domain 
of  civilization  has  been  an  enrichment  of 
the  civilization  of  the  peoples  among  whom 
they  have  lived.  Jews  have  always  been  prom- 
inent in  commerce  and  industry,  but  there  was 
no  national  Jewish  commerce  and  no  national 
Jewish  industry,  even  when  those  who  created 
and  developed  certain  branches  of  commerce 
were  all  Jews.  Their  commercial  and  indus- 
trial activities  and  accomplishments  strength- 
ened the  other  nations  among  whom  the  Jews 
lived,  but  not  themselves.  In  many  cases  they 
have  endangered  and  imperiled  the  Jewish. 


10 


people,  because  they  became  the  arsenal  of 
anti-Semitic  weapons.  The  individual  has 
profited  by  Jewish  industrial  and  commercial 
achievements,  but  not  the  Jewish  collective 
body.  In  short,  all  our  work  and  energy  in 
the  domain  of  practical  civilization  has  reached 
not  the  Jewish  people,  but  other  nations,  and 
only  a  few  have  given  us  credit  for  these 
achievements. 

Often   enough   have   we   been   blamed   for 
them.     The  Dutchman  is  full  of  envy  of  the 
Jew  to  the  present  day  for  having  monopolized 
the  diamond  cutting  industry;  the  Turks  are 
still  angry  when  they  remember  that  Baron 
de  Hirsch  built  their  railroads.     In  Switzer- 
land people  are  blaming  the  Jews  for  having 
monopolized  the  silk  and  w^atch  industries; 
the    Russians    antagonize    them    because    of 
their  big  share  in  the  development  of  the  petrol 
Tvells  in  the  Caucasus  and  in  the  lumber  busi- 
ness in  western  Russia.     A  famous  German 
professor,    Werner    Sombart,   has   written    a 
voluminous   book   of   ^Ye   hundred   pages   in 
which  he  indicts  us  for  having  developed  cap- 
italism, while  others  are  accusing  the  Jews  of 
having  produced  anti-capitalistic  forces.     In 
short,  not  only  have  the  activities  of  individual 


11 


Jews  in  the  domain  of  civilization  not  been  of 
profit  to  them  as  a  people,  but  they  have  in 
too  many  cases  served  as  a  basis  of  attack. 

The  cause  of  these  peculiar  phenomena  was 
our  diaspora  life.  We  had  no  homeland  of 
our  own.  We  had  no  national  soil  beneath  us 
and  no  national  sky  above  us.  We  were  a 
wandering  people  and  as  such  could  not  pro- 
duce a  national  civilization,  which  involves 
and  presupposes  a  static  and  not  a  dynamic 
order  of  things.  But  as  soon  as  the  Jews  can 
lead  a  normal  national  life,  all  this,  unhappy 
and  tragic,  will  change  radically  and  an  en- 
tirely new  order  of  things  will  arise.  Not  the 
Jewish  individual,  as  heretofore,  but  the  Jew- 
ish people  at  large,  will  be  the  agency  of  the 
Jewish  genius  and  whatever  the  Jewish  indi- 
vidual has  to  contribute  to  civilization  he  will 
contribute  through  the  Jewish  people.  While 
his  achievements  in  this  domain  will  serve 
humanity,  as  heretofore,  they  will  at  the  same 
time  enrich  the  life  of  his  own  people  and  be- 
come a  source  of  strength  instead  of  weakness ; 
when  the  Jews  have  an  opportunity  to  be 
active  for  civilization  as  Jews,  Jewish  indi- 
vidualism, the  curse  of  our  racial  life,  will 
gradually  disappear. 


12 


Only  a  few  of  us  realize  the  fact  that  this 
individualism,  which  finds  its  unpleasant  ex- 
pression in  petty  factionalism,  communal 
strife,  party  quarrels  and  lack  of  discipline 
among  the  rank  and  file,  is  in  the  main  to 
be  ascribed  to  the  fact  that  the  Jews  have  no 
national  civilization.  If  we  had  one,  many 
an  unpleasant  phenomenon  in  our  public  life 
would  be  impossible.  If  the  Jews  had  common 
political  responsibilities,  if  they  had  all  to  look 
to  the  safety  of  their  country,  if  they  had  all 
to  look  after  their  national  economic  interests, 
the  national  intellect  would  be  more  uniform 
and  two  Jews  would  not  have  three  different 
opinions.  It  is  the  lack  of  a  national  Jewish 
civilization  that  makes  the  Jewish  intellect 
queer  and  misshapen.  The  mind  of  a  people 
can  only  be  trained  by  its  national  civilization, 
and  is  orientated  by  it.  But  since  the  Jews 
have  lacked  national  civilization  for  the  last 
two  thousand  years,  the  intellect  of  tlie  nation 
has  lost  its  uniformity,  has  become  atomized 
and  has  in  many  eases  gone  astray.  This  has 
added  to  our  inner  misery  and  has  driven 
many  an  idealistic  Jew  to  despair.  At  the 
moment  when  the  Jews  begin  to  lead  a  national 
life  on  national  soil  and  under  their  own  sky. 


13 


which  give  out  line  and  color  to  the  soul  of  a 
nation,  many  negative  energies  which  are 
active  in  our  life  because  of  the  effects  of 
diaspora  existence  must  necessarily  disappear. 
The  intellectual  discipline  of  the  nation  will 
be  re-established  and  the  life  of  its  soul  will 
again  assume  normal  proportions.  There  will 
be  a  Jewish  public  opinion  in  the  best  meaning 
of  the  term,  not  merely  the  opinion  of  in- 
dividual Jews. 

It  is  generally  asserted  that,  though  the  Jews 
as  such  have  not  produced  a  civilization  during 
their  life  in  diaspora,  they  have  produced  a 
culture.  This  is  sincerely  believed  by  all 
Jews,  by  believers  and  disbelievers,  orthodox 
and  reform,  nationalists  and  assimilationists. 
Though  one  lays  more  stress  on  the  spiritual 
and  the  other  more  on  the  secular  aspect  of  the 
so-called  Jewish  culture,  the  outstanding  fact 
is,  however,  that  the  belief  in  the  Jewish  cul- 
ture produced  in  the  diaspora  is  general.  But 
if  it  is  true  that  culture  is  a  superstructure  of 
civilization  and  has  civilization  as  its  basis,  it 
is  hard  to  see  how  it  is  possible  to  assume  for 
one  moment  that  the  Jews  have  produced  any- 
thing like  a  culture  during  their  diaspora  life. 

It  is  true  that  Jews  have  written  books 


14 


among  which  some  are  famous  in  world-litera- 
ture. It  is  true  that  the  Jews  have  painted 
good  pictures.  It  is  also  true  that  the  Jews 
have  composed  good  music.  But  the  question 
is  often  more  than  justified  whether  or  not  the 
Jewish  genius  has  drawn  the  material  from 
Jewish  sources  and  Jewish  life.  Are  all  the 
good  books  Jews  have  written  Jewish  books? 
Are  all  the  good  pictures  Jews  have  painted 
Jewish  art?  And  is  the  good  music  Jews  have 
composed  Jewish  music?  In  some  cases  they 
are  partly  Jewish.  In  the  oven\^helming  ma- 
jority of  cases  they  are  not  Jewish  at  all. 
Neither  Spinoza  nor  Bergson,  neither  Heine 
nor  Hoffmannsthal,  are  Jews  in  the  sense  that 
they  have  been  inspired  exclusively  by  Jewish 
motives  and  that  they  have  drawn  their  in- 
spiration from  Jewish  sources  alone.  But  we 
can  go  even  further  and  maintain  that  even 
those  great  Jews  from  Philo  of  Alexandria  to 
Maimonides  and  from  Maimonides  to  Herman 
Cohen,  who  were  always  conscious  of  their 
Judaism  and  who  thought  that  they  were 
working  as  Jews  and  that  their  creations  were 
Jewish,  stood  much  more  under  the  spell  of 
alien  than  Jewish  influence,  and  in  their 
work  were  less  Jews  than  is  generally  sup- 


15 


posed.  In  spite  of  their  racial  enthusiasm, 
their  intellect  was  hyphenated.  Philo  was  at 
least  as  much  Greek  as  he  was  Jew,  Maimon- 
ides  at  least  as  much  Greek  and  Arab,  and 
Cohen  is  at  least  as  much  German  as  he  is 
Jew,  if  not  more. 

We  are  quick  in  our  condemnation  of  those 
who  wrote  on  the  tombstone  of  Maimonides, 
"Heretic  and  Disbeliever."  We  are  angry  at 
the  "fanatics"  of  Amsterdam  who  excommuni- 
cated Spinoza,  and  we  are  often  angry  at  those 
who  utter  severe  criticism  of  Herman  Cohen  as 
a  Jew.  But  these  fanatics,  wrong  as  they  may 
be  in  their  methods,  are  not  entirely  wrong  in 
their  motives  and  ideas.  They  are  Jews  in 
whom  strong  Jewish  instincts  are  alive  and 
these  Jews,  gifted  with  more  original  instincts 
than  the  average  Jew,  see  more  quickly  what  is 
Jewish  and  what  is  not  in  the  work  of  a  great 
Jew ;  it  is  the  un- Jewish  motive  in  these  works 
by  which  they  are  repulsed. 

Even  the  Jewish  religion  has  been  largely 
influenced,  not  only  by  non-Jewish  surround- 
ings, but  also  by  non-Jewish  religious  motives. 
The  truth  of  the  matter  is  that  national  Jew- 
ish culture  ceased  to  be  with  the  destruction 
of  the  Jewish  state.    From  that  time  on,  in- 


dividual  Jews  have  cultivated  Jewish  thoughts 
and  Jewish  feelings,  but  they  could  not  pre- 
vent their  thoughts  and  feelings  from  being  so 
mingled  with   and   darkened  by   non-Jewish 
thoughts  and  feelings  as  to  lose  their  original 
strength.      Much    of    our    so-called    national 
literature  is  not  organic,  but  consists  of  a 
number  of  books  written  by  individual  Jews 
who  were  only  too  often  inspired  by  motives 
more  non-Jewish  than  Jewish.     The  same  is 
true  of  Jewish  art,  Jewish  music,  etc.    Only 
when  our  culture  touches  upon  our  classical 
past  or  upon  our  national  future,  that  is  to 
say,  when  it  is  not  influenced  by  the  chaos  of 
the  present,  is  it  truly  Jewish. 

When  the  Jews  return  to  Palestine  and 
begin  to  develop  a  national  civilization,  their 
culture  will  be  built  up  not  only  on  the 
past  or  the  future,  but  also  on  the  present.  It 
will  grow  with  the  growth  of  civilization  and 
it  will  not  be  a  culture  of  individuals  who  are 
inspired  by  one  thought  appearing  in  different 
colors  as  the  result  of  various  influences;  it 
will  be  the  culture  of  a  nation,  an  organic 
essence  produced  and  developed  with  the  help 
of  the  entire  nation. 

This  will  be  the  consequence  of  a  national 
Jewish  home-land  in  Palestine. 


17 


PALESTINE'S  ROLE  IN  THE  WORLD'S 
HISTORY 


E 


VEN  territories  are  subject  to  the  incal- 
culable caprice  of  Fate.  Palestine,  a 
small  territory  in  Western  Asia,  forming  the 
southern  third  of  the  province  of  Syria,  ex- 
celled in  natural  beauty  by  Switzerland  or  the 
Tyrol,  has  nevertheless  been  touched  by  the 
Spirit  of  Humanity  and  has  exerted  a  greater 
influence  upon  the  development  of  the  human 
mind  than  any  other  country  in  the  world,  not 
excepting  ancient  Hellas  and  Rome.  There 
is  hardly  another  land  that  has  witnessed  as 
great  historic  events  as  has  Palestine;  there  is 
surely  no  other  land  that  has  seen  so  many 
invading  conquerors  on  its  soil.  No  other  spot 
on  the  globe  has  so  kindled  the  magnetism  of 
the  great  nations  throughout  the  ages  as 
Palestine.  Today,  when  an  army  of  the 
mighty  British  Empire  is  fighting  hard  to 
conquer  Palestine,  the  land  of  eternal  mystery 
and  miracles,  it  is  well  to  remember  that 
throughout  the  ages  every  great  power  has 


18 


fought  for  the  possession  of  the  Holy  Land. 
In  the  early  days  of  our  civilization  Baby- 
lonians, Eg}^ptians,  Assyrians  and  Persians  in 
turn  tried  to  conquer  the  country.  At  a  later 
time,  the  Greeks  and  the  Romans  made  the 
attempt;  in  the  middle  ages  the  great  nations 
of  Europe  were  organized  by  the  Church  to 
wrest  Palestine  from  the  Mohammedans.  All 
the  great  conquerors  in  history,  from  Nebuza- 
radan  and  Titus  to  Napoleon,  have  com- 
manded invading  armies  on  Palestine  soil. 

This  small  land  of  Palestine,  drenched  with 
human  blood  since  time  immemorial,  has  be- 
come the  holy  centre  of  three  great  religion*^, 
and  witnessed  the  birth  of  two  great  religions, 
Judaism  and  Christianity.  From  the  purely 
religious  point  of  view  the  land  is  as  holy  to 
Islam  as  it  is  to  Christendom  or  Jewry.  Polit- 
ically, it  has  always  been  and  still  remains  the 
goal  of  many  a  great  power.  The  Turk  holds 
it,  the  British  are  anxious  to  conquer  it,  the 
French  have  politico-historical  claims  on 
Syria,  which  includes  Palestine,  the  Roman 
Church  considers  it  its  special  domain  and 
aspires  to  possess  it;  the  Emperor  of  Austria 
still  bears  the  title  King  of  Jerusalem,  and  the 
King  of  the  Belgians,  on  the  assumption  that 


19 


he  is  an  offspring  of  the  Crusader  Prince  who 
ruled  over  Jerusalem  for  a  while,  asserts  his- 
toric claims  on  the  Holy  Land  which,  how- 
ever, he  does  not  press.  Palestine  has  seen 
many  a  change  of  masters  and  has  been  in- 
habited in  turn  by  many  peoples.  But  among 
all  the  peoples  that  have  lived  in  Palestine 
there  is  only  one,  the  nationhood  and  culture 
of  which  has  grown  and  developed  there — the 
Jewish  people. 

The  Judaism  originating  in  Palestine  has 
become  one  of  the  driving  powers  in  history; 
it  continues  to  fructify  the  human  mind  of  the 
present  day.  Mankind  bears  in  mind  that  just 
as  in  modern  philosophy  there  is  scarcely  a 
single  thought  that  w^as  not  already  known 
either  to  the  Greeks  or  to  the  Romans,  so  in 
modern  social  ethics,  humanitarianism  and 
countless  branches  of  modern  political  life 
there  is  scarcely  an  idea  or  thought  that  was 
not  propounded  by  the  representatives  of  the 
ancient  Jewish  mind.  Many  a  radical  idea 
commonly  supposed  to  be  a  product  of  the 
civilization  of  the  19th  century  is  found  on 
close  examination  to  be  the  embodiment  of  an 
ancient  Jewish  idea  born  on  Palestinian  soil. 
The  kernel  and  sum  total  of  Marxism  is  of 


20 


ancient  Jewish  origin;  Karl  Marx  added  a 
modern  garb  to  an  ancient  Jewish  thought. 

But  Palestine  has  witnessed  not  only  the 
birth  and  development  of  Judaism  but  also 
of  Christianity.  Christianity  is,  reduced 
to  its  original  components,  a  synthesis  of 
Eastern  and  Western  Aryan  thought,  consist- 
ing of  the  universalism  and  pessimism  of 
ancient  India  and  the  individualism  and  opti- 
mism of  the  Greeks  and  Komans.  Christian- 
ity is  therefore  not  only  not  a  continuation  of 
Judaism,  but  its  very  antithesis,  despite  the 
fact  that  there  is  nothing  in  Eastern  Aryan 
and  Western  Aryan  thought,  when  looked  at 
separately,  that  cannot  also  be  found  in  Juda- 
ism. 

The  fight  for  Palestine  by  the  great  nations 
of  ancient  times,  the  origin  and  growth  of  two 
historic  religions  on  Palestinian  soil,  the  sub- 
sequent struggle  for  Palestine  by  united 
Christendom  against  the  Islam  and  the  con- 
stant attention  that  humanity  pays  to  Pales- 
tine does  not  explain  why  Palestine  is  held 
sacred.  Another  explanation  must  be  found 
why  Palestine,  a  strip  of  coast  land  on  the 
Mediterranean,  has  become  the  land  of  won- 
ders, the  cradle  of  European  spiritualism. 


21 


Palestine  has  become  the  very  well  and 
centre  of  the  spiritual  life  of  humanity  because 
she  was  so  placed  geographically  as  to  be  in  a 
position  to  mediate  between  the  Eastern  and 
the  Western  Aryans  and  because  Jewish 
thought,  born  in  Palestine,  the  mediating 
centre,  was  later  to  act  as  the  spiritual  medi- 
ator between  both  wings  of  the  Aryan  race 
without  giving  up  its  own  position  and  inde- 
pendence. 

The  geographical  position  of  the  region 
where  Judaism  arose  is  located  just  between 
the  settlements  of  the  West  and  East  Aryans. 
Just  as  Palestine  is  the  geographical  centre 
between  East  and  West  Aryans,  so  also  does 
the  Jewish  mind  born  in  Palestine  mediate 
between  Tibet  and  Greece. 

The  East  Aryans  believed  in  the  universal, 
the  infinite — the  West  Aryans  in  the  indi- 
vidual, as  expressed  in  classic  mythology.  The 
Jewish  God-concept  comprises  both  of  these 
extremes.  The  Jewish  God  is  the  highest  in- 
dividuality, but  he  is  also  God  who  has  created 
the  universe,  the  God  of  all  mankind.  The 
Biblical  cosmogony  shows  combination  of  this 
individuality  with  universality.  As  the 
Biblical    metaphysic    mediates    between    the 


22 


extremes  of  Aryan  thought,  so  does  the  Jew- 
ish mind  born  in  Palestine  hold  the  middle 
betrv^een  Greek  and  Indian  thought.  The 
Jewish  mind  lacks  both  the  cold,  analytical 
intellectuality  of  the  Greek  and  the  mystic, 
fantastical  tendency  of  the  Indian  mind.  With 
the  Jew,  however,  reason  is  praised  and  knowl- 
edge highly  valued,  while  feeling  is  given  its 
due  and  is  not  mortified.  The  prophet  is  not 
an  individualist  nor  is  he  a  hazy  universalist, 
but  a  self-sacrificing  patriot  who  for  the 
love  of  his  people  suffers  martyrdom,  and  yet 
a  cosmopolitan  who  in  his  heart  full  of  love 
embraces  all  mankind. 

When  the  two  Aryan  culture  thoughts  met 
in  Alexandria  and  Eome,  the  Jewish  thought 
intervened  and  acted  as  mediator  between  the 
two  extremes.  Of  course  it  was  not  done  by 
conscious  design,  but  we  cannot  disregard  the 
influence  men  like  Philo  exercised  on  the 
course  of  events.  While  many  momenta  and 
causes  co-operated  in  making  the  Jew  the 
mediator  between  these  two  extremes,  the  main 
cause  no  doubt  was  the  middle  position  oc- 
cupied by  Judaism.  It  was  related  to  both 
sides  and  could  therefore  effect  a  reconcilia- 
tion. 


23 


This,  to  our  mind,  explains  in  the  main  the 
place  of  Palestine  and  Judaism  in  the  world^s 
history.  The  Jews,  a  small  Asiatic  people, 
owing  to  a  remarkable  concatenation  of  events 
and  chances,  have  set  in  motion  a  circulation 
of  ideas,  which  later  on  cemented  other  great 
cultures.  Christianity  is  not,  as  Christian 
theologians  w^ould  have  the  world  believe,  a 
continuation  of  Judaism.  What  Judaism  in 
the  main  did  contribute  to  Christianity  was  the 
form,  the  architecture,  and  the  cohesive  power 
of  its  various  elements.  If  there  be  any  truth 
in  the  assertion  that  the  Jews  are  the  "ever- 
lasting middlemen,"  it  is  not  because  they  have 
been  for  the  last  two  thousand  years  the  eco- 
nomic or  political  middlemen  among  the 
nations  who  forced  them  into  a  parasitical  life, 
but  because  they,  a  Palestinian  people,  have 
brouglit  about  a  union  between  worlds  of 
thought  which  were  arrayed  against  each 
other.  By  reason  of  this  mediation,  they  have 
impregnated  other  peoples  with  their  own 
mind, 


24 


JUDAIZING  PALESTINE 

IN  spite  of  the  political  and  diplomatic  events 
of  the  two  months  preceding  the  Baltimore 
Zionist  Convention,  not  one  of  the  responsible 
Zionist  leaders  uttered  a  word  with  regard  to 
the  political  situation  pertaining  to  Palestine. 
The  various  rumors  concerning  a  Jewish  re- 
public in  Palestine  have  been  answered  by  the 
representatives  of  American  Zionism  with — 
silence.  This  attitude  on  the  part  of  the  re- 
sponsible Zionist  leaders  testifies  to  their 
political  ability  and  tact,  for  nothing  would  be 
more  dangerous  today  than  to  discuss  Pales- 
tine at  a  Zionist  assembly  in  as  careless  a 
manner  as  persons  have  done  for  the  last  few 
months.  The  situation  is  still  fraught  with 
difficulties,  dangers  and  uncertainty;  and  the 
less  it  is  spoken  of  the  better  for  all  parties 
concerned.  The  question  on  the  lips  of  every 
delegate  to  the  convention:  What  have  we  to 
expect?  has  been  well  answered  by  the  repre- 
sentative of  the  Provisional  Committee  for 
General  Zionist  Affairs — We  expect  to  be  able 


25 


to  create  after  the  war  such  conditions  in 
Palestine  as  to  enable  us  to  carry  out  our  pro- 
gram. To  those  delegates  who  are  not  able  to 
think  in  terms  of  statesmanship  the  answer  of 
the  official  representatives  of  the  Provisional 
Committee  must  have  appeared  to  be  unsatis- 
factory, but  the  better  politically  trained  Zion- 
ists appreciated  the  answer  as  the  only  one 
possible  under  the  present  circumstances  and 
it  convinced  them  that  the  leaders  in  this 
country  are  politically  on  the  right  track. 

All  the  talk  about  a  speedy  establishment  of 
a  Jewish  republic  in  Palestine  in  which  even 
a  part  of  the  general  press  indulged  is  pure 
fancy  if  we  consider  things  in  the  light  of 
reality.  A  republic  or  any  form  of  state  can- 
not be  made — it  must  grow  naturally  from 
certain  given  conditions,  it  must  develop 
organically.  So  long  as  the  people  and  the 
people's  land  are  separated  physically  from 
one  another,  how  can  the  synthesis  of  the  state 
be  won?  It  is,  therefore,  clear  that  the  very 
first  condition  for  the  realization  of  the  Zionist 
program  is  a  settlement  of  Jews  in  Palestine 
en  masse,  which  settlement  is  not  possible  un- 
less certain  economic  conditions  are  created  to 
enable  the  settlers  to  organize  their  life  speed- 


U6 


ilj  and  acclimatize  themselves  as  quickly  as 
possible.  But  this  creating  of  conditions  is 
not  as  easy  a  task  as  many  persons  imagine. 
It  not  only  presumes  a  favorable  political  situ- 
ation, but  also  a  display  of  organizing  genius, 
important  financial  transactions  and  almost 
heroic  deeds.  If  Palestine  were  an  industrial 
country  where  new  industries  could  be  created 
or  the  old  ones  so  developed  as  to  give  susten- 
ance to  masses  of  new  settlers,  the  task  would 
not  be  difficult.  Palestine,  however,  is  at 
present  not  an  industrial  country,  there  are 
no  mines  and  consequently  no  factories  of  im- 
portance; it  is  altogether  an  agricultural 
country,  the  soil  of  which,  though  potentially 
very  productive,  has  been  neglected  for  cen- 
turies and  must  be  regenerated  before  it  can 
produce  enough  to  feed  a  large  population. 
But  even  if  Palestine  were  an  industrial  coun- 
try it  would  be  an  unwise  policy  to  make  in- 
dustry the  economic  basis  of  the  future  popu- 
lation. If  the  Jewish  people  are  going  to  be 
reborn  not  only  politically  but  also  physically, 
mentally  and  morally,  the  masses  of  the  Jew- 
ish people  must  return  to  agriculture  and  to 
country  life.  For  tlie  last  two  thousand  years 
we  have  been  a  city-population  and  we  have 


57 


acquired  all  tlie  habits  and  qualities  of  one. 
City  life  has  wrought  havoc  among  us.  If 
Zionism  has  a  philosophy  then  the  return 
of  large  numbers  of  the  Jews  to  country- 
life  is  part  and  parcel  of  that  philosophy  by 
which  we  must  abide  if  we  do  not  mean  to  de- 
ceive ourselves.  Besides,  agriculture  is  a  much 
sounder  basis  for  a  state  than  industry.  The 
agricultural  country  is  peaceful,  conservative, 
moderate,  while  the  industrial  country  is  al- 
ways restless,  upset,  radical  and  bellicose.  If 
an  individualistic — and  because  of  a  long  life 
in  the  dispersion — nervous  people  like  the  Jews 
should  build  its  entire  future  on  industry,  it 
would  be  built  on  sand.  For  this  and  many 
other  good  reasons,  we  must  make  agriculture 
the  main  economic  basis  of  Jewish  life  in  Pales- 
tine. But  to  create  favorable  agricultural 
conditions  to  enable  an  immigration  en  masse 
to  Palestine  is  much  more  difficult  than  to 
create  favorable  industrial  conditions,  es- 
pecially in  view  of  the  fact  that  the  Palestinian 
soil  has  been  neglected. 

The  economic  future  of  Palestine  rests  to 
our  present  knowledge  on  agriculture  and 
trade.  For  the  past  ten  years  Palestinian 
trade  has  been  increasing  from  year  to  year, 


28 


especially  that  of  commerce  in  fruit  and  wine. 
Palestine  can,  if  its  soil  is  properly  tilled  and 
modern  agricultural  methods  used,  produce 
such  quantities  of  fruits  and  grain  as  not  only 
to  feed  the  native  population  but  also  to  sui> 
ply  other  countries.  The  same  holds  true  of 
wine  and  tobacco  and  probably  cotton.  In- 
dustries can  be  established  which  have  the 
home  products  as  a  main  basis,  such  as  can- 
ning and  packing  industries,  manufacture  of 
soap,  perfumes,  etc.  The  possibilities  of  pas- 
toral industry  in  Palestine  are  enormous,  and 
industrious  Jewish  ranchers  may  turn  Eastern 
Palestine  into  a  second  Texas. 

There  are  altogether  vast  possibilities  and 
should  a  favorable  political  situation  enable 
us  to  revive  and  to  create  the  necessary  eco- 
nomic conditions  for  a  Jewish  settlement  en 
masse  in  the  land,  Jewish  industry  and  Jewish 
financial  strength  combined  with  Jewish  ideal- 
ism would  within  a  few  years  of  hard  work 
prepare  the  ground  for  a  realization  of  the 
Zionist  program.  This  is  what  the  Zionist 
leaders  have  in  mind  when  they  speak  of  creat- 
ing such  conditions  in  Palestine.  It  is  further 
understood  that  next  to  the  preparing  of  eco- 
nomic conditions,  something  must  be  done  in 


29 


the  field  of  social  and  cultural  preparation. 
When  a  group  of  Jews  is  sent  to  Palestine,  it 
must  find  there  such  social  and  cultural 
preparations  as  to  make  civilized  life  possible. 
One  cannot,  of  course,  build  communities, 
schools,  social  and  charitable  institutions  in 
Palestine  before  large  masses  of  our  people 
have  settled  in  the  country.  The  ground  for 
the  establishment  of  such  institutions  must  be 
prepared  before  the  actual  immigration  takes 
place  for  we  will  not  send  our  people  to  a 
wilderness.  The  Jewish  groups  that  will 
emigrate  to  Palestine  may  not  find  actually 
erected  all  the  schools  and  hospitals  they 
need,  but  they  must  find  everything  that  is 
necessary  for  re-establishment  of  such  institu- 
tions and  the  men  needed  to  conduct  them. 
This  is  not  an  easy  task  but  it  can  be  accom- 
plished if  we  centre  our  organizing  genius  on 
it.  In  this  way  we  can  Judaize  Palestine  in  a 
relatively  short  time  and  when  this  is  done  the 
geographic  and  economic  position  will  be  used 
for  a  strengthening  of  all  the  sociological 
factors  which  are  necessary  for  the  creation  of 
a  Jewish  homeland.  Palestine,  on  account  of 
its  geographic  condition  can  again  be  developed 
to  a  mighty  trade  centre  and  it  can  become  the 


30 


great  commercial  roadway  between  Europe, 
Africa  and  Western  Asia.  This,  together 
with  its  solid  economic  and  social  organiza- 
tion, will  give  Palestine  political  strength  and 
position  among  the  civilized  countries  in  the 
world. 

It  can  thus  be  seen  that  it  is  futile  at  pres- 
ent to  talk  of  the  immediate  establishment  of 
a  Jewish  republic  in  Palestine.  The  very 
best  that  can  be  done  and  will  be  done  is  to 
prepare  the  ground  economically,  socially  and 
culturally  for  the  settlement  of  great  masses 
of  our  people  in  the  Holy  Land.  And  it  will 
be  for  the  settlers  to  shape  the  future  'and  to 
strive  to  realize  the  Zionist  Ideal :  A  perman- 
ently secured  liomeland  for  the  Jewish  people 
in  the  land  of  its  ancestors.  Unless  this  big 
work  is  done,  no  power  on  earth  can  help  us 
carry  out  our  national  political  program,  be- 
cause states  cannot  be  made  but  must  develop 
organically. 


31 


NATIONAL  EXISTENCE  AND  NATIONAL 
HISTORIC  LIFE 

WHAT  is  the  essence  of  the  historic  life  of 
a  people?  This  question  has  been  on 
the  program  of  the  sociologist  ever  since  so- 
ciety began  to  free  itself  from  the  hold  of 
the  state.  Prior  to  the  French  Revolution, 
when  society  and  the  state  were  interlinked  by 
thousands  of  strands,  the  belief  was  current 
that  the  national  state — particularly,  the  well 
organized,  centralized  state — is  the  essence  of 
the  historic  life  of  a  people.  It  was  thought 
that  as  soon  as  a  special  form  of  government 
was  overturned  the  people  would  turn  loose 
like  a  herd  of  wild  men.  Then  came  the  French 
Revolution  and  laid  the  prestige  of  the  state 
low.  A  national  society  began  to  organize, 
outside  the  state,  and  became  a  historic  factor 
of  its  own  account.  It  then  became  evident 
that  the  state  was  not  the  only  essence  of  the 
historic  life  of  a  people,  that  there  were  other 
factors  equally,  or  even  more  important,  and 
that  no  national  historic  life  could  exist  with- 


32 


out  them.  Only  a  short  time  before  the  French 
Kevolution,  a  French  historian  said  that  the 
Chinese  nation,  despite  its  living  a  national 
life,  is  only  existing  in  a  historic  sense,  be- 
cause it  has  no  influence  upon  the  historic  pro- 
cess, and  plays  no  part  in  the  production  of 
cultural  values  for  the  human  race.  In  short, 
the  Chinese  nation  lives  outside  the  pale  of 
history.  Now  then,  if  a  people  like  that  of 
China,  numbering  hundreds  of  millions  of 
souls  and  living  on  its  own  soil  under  the 
auspices  of  its  own  government,  is  placed  in 
the  category  of  nations  that  merely  exist ,  other 
nationalities  of  smaller  numbers  and  having 
no  national  government  are  certainly  not  to 
be  classed  as  historically  living  nations. 

Liberal-minded  thinkers,  whose  thought 
was  influenced  directly  by  the  events  of  the 
French  Revolution  endeavored  to  minimize 
the  historic  glory  of  the  state  and  reduce  it  to 
only  one  of  the  factors  in  the  historic  life  of 
a  people.  The  conservatives  on  the  other 
hand  endeavored  to  restore  to  the  state  its  old 
glory.  The  controversy  was  especially  intense 
in  Germany.  Hegel,  the  father  of  conservative 
philosophy  in  Germany,  raised  the  state  to 
the  pedestal  of  a  deity,  characterizing  it  as 


33 


the  aim  and  substance  of  historic  development, 
in  general,  and  as  the  most  significant  phen- 
omenon in  history.  Johann  Fichte,  Hegel's 
contemporary  and  opponent,  the  father  of  the 
national  doctrine  in  Germany  gave  society  the 
first  place,  and  looked  upon  the  state  as  a 
necessary  evil.  He  regarded  culture,  with  the 
exception  of  art,  as  opposed  to  the  state.  The 
essence  of  historic  life  was  to  him  not  the 
political  life  of  the  people  but  its  ethics, 
science,  religion  and  art.  The  state  can  have 
a  positive  attitude  towards  art  alone — all  the 
other  elements,  such  as  science,  religion  and 
ethics,  must  enjoy  the  freedom  and  independ- 
ence which  the  state  can  not  always  grant  to 
them.  According  to  him,  therefore,  not  polit- 
ical acts  but  scientific  cognition  and  intellect- 
ual development  are  the  driving  forces  in  the 
historic  life  of  a  people. 

Even  Kant  himself — ^who  gave  preference 
to  the  state — recognized  a  certain  antagonism 
between  ethics  and  the  state.  The  state  is 
the  realm  of  law,  while  ethics  has  its  origin  in 
conscience.  The  romantic  philosophy,  which 
attempted  to  solve  this  problem  from  the 
standpoint  of  esthetics  culminated  in  the  ex- 
treme individualism  which  found  its  highest 


34 


expression  in  the  doctrines  of  Nietzsche.  The 
superman,  the  great  personality  which  a  people 
produces  is  according  to  this  doctrine  the 
aim  and  end  of  history,  and,  naturally,  that 
of  the  historic  life  of  a  people.  Herder  hinted 
at  this  conclusion,  Schelling  developed  the 
doctrine  and  Kietzsche — the  extremist  of  ro- 
manticists—perfected it.  But  this  historic 
personality  of  the  romantic  philosophers  is 
not  only,  as  many  are  inclined  to  believe,  an 
intellectual  being.  The  great  philosopher^  or 
the  great  artist  is  not  the  historic  personality, 
but  the  man  of  great  deeds ;  for  history  is  first 
and  foremost  the  realm  of  action  and  not  that 
of  thought.  Nietzsche's  "blond  beast,"  that 
is,  the  man  of  great  passions  and  great  deeds, 
is  the  historic  personality,  that  motive  power 
in  historic  life,  in  general,  and  the  life  of  the 

nation  in  particular. 

*     *     ♦ 

If  we  look  upon  Jewish  history  in  the 
Diaspora  in  the  light  of  classic,  or  romantic, 
or  even  modern  philosophy,  we  are  bound  to 
come  to  the  conclusion  that  the  Jewish  people 
ceased  to  live  a  historic  national  life  when 
it  was  exiled  from  its  land.  We  have  not 
lived  a  political  life  during  the  past  two  thou- 


35 


sand  years;  hence  we  could  not  contribute  to 
the  civilization  of  mankind,  for  a  national 
civilization  is  possible  only  in  a  national  state. 
True,  we  have  produced  many  great  personal- 
ities, but  the  Jewish  great  personality  in  the 
Goluth  is  not  a  great  Jewish  personality — in 
the  majority  of  cases  it  is  merely  an  intellec- 
tual personality:  a  poet,  an  artist,  a  phil- 
osopher, etc.  Lord  Beaconsfield  certainly 
was  a  great  historic  personality ;  but  who  would 
dare  claim  this  statesman  as  a  Jewish  historic 
personality — the  product  of  Jewish  culture? 
His  deeds  are  chronicled  in  the  history  of  the 
English  people;  his  historic  accomplishments 
are  the  historic  accomplishments  of  the  Eng- 
lish people.  It  was  not  the  Jew  Disraeli  who 
procured  the  Suez  Canal  for  the  Jewish  peo- 
ple, but  the  English  statesman,  the  Lord 
Beaconsfield  who  acquired  it  for  the  English 
people. 

The  Jewish  great  personality  displayed  its 
talent  in  various  intellectual  fields,  but  did 
nothing  in  the  political  field,  for  which  it 
lacked  the  necessary  conditions.  For  two 
thousand  years,  we  have  lived  an  unhistoric 
life— -the  life  of  Chinese,  with  the  exception 
that  the  Chinese  live  on  their  own  soil  and  were 


S€ 


spared  the  persecutions  that  fell  to  our  lot. 
We  eked  out  an  existence ;  but  we  did  not  live. 
Hence  the  entire  history  of  the  Jewish  people 
for  the  past  two  thousand  years  is  a  history 
of  Jewish  literature.  Since  the  deteriora- 
tion of  the  JcAvish  state^  Judaism  has  been  a 
mere  literary  tendency  in  general  history;  an 
interesting  tendency,  to  be  sure,  occasionally 
even  original,  but  not  more  than  a  literary 
tendency.  Not  our  historic  deeds  but  the  ab- 
stract thought  alone  aided  us  in  continuing 
our  existence — our  philosophy,  poetry,  ethics, 
and  religious  cravings  kept  us  alive.  We  the 
bearers  of  that  literary  aspiration  have  been 
going  a-begging  for  thousands  of  years.  We 
wandered  from  land  to  land  and  from  sea  to 
sea  without  an  end  in  view.  All  our  political 
achievements  have  been  concentrated  in  our 
memory  for  the  past  two  thousand  years.  We 
remembered  that  we  once  were  a  people  like 
every  other  people,  and  by  the  mere  force  of 
these  memories  we  went  wherever  we  were 
directed.  Thus  in  our  long  travels  we  have  be- 
come spiritualized,  we  have  converted  a  system 
of  national  culture  with  laws  and  regulations 
about  the  state  and  its  rulers  to  a  system  of 
theology.    The  ancient  Hebrew  culture  which 


37 


is  essentially  a  secular  culture  became  to  us 
a  sacred  thing.     The  Hebrew  prophets,  who 
were  historic  personalities  in  the  full  sense  of 
the  word,  because  they  were  men  of  action, 
statesmen  and  warriors  of  political  battles, 
were  raised  by  us  to  the  category  of  saints  in 
the  theological  sense.     Thus  the  Hebrew  cul- 
ture was  reduced  to  a  mere  theological  system. 
We  lived  in  a  Roman  environment,  that  is, 
in  an  environment  which  draws  its  strength 
from  ancient  Rome,  whose  program  was  the 
state,  practical  civilization,  wars,  conquests, 
revolts,  political  reorganization,  etc.    In  such 
an    environment    with    its   peculiar    culture, 
there  was  no  room  for  the  ancient  Jewish  cul- 
ture based   on   ethical    teachings,    which,    in 
order  to  be  able  to  maintain  its  existence,  was 
compelled  to  confine  itself  within  the  walls 
of  the  synagogue.    In  short,  it  is  not  only  im- 
possible to  create  new  cultural  values  in  the 
Diaspora  but  even  to  continue  the  thread  of 
the  ancient  Hebrew  idea,  in  essence  an  idea 
of  civilization.     In  exile,  more  so  in  Roman 
exile,  there  was  no  past  and  no  future  for 
Judaism.     Ancient  Judaism  was   a  historic 
and  not  a  literary  phenomenon;  hence,  since 
it  has  been  the  destiny  of  the  Jewish  people  for 


38 


the  past  two  thousand  years  to  exist,  and  not 
to  live  a  normal  national  life,  it  is  even  un- 
able to  preserve  the  memories  of  a  historic 
past. 

Then  came  Zionism.  The  nationalistic  trend 
in  history  has  influenced  the  Jewish  people 
too.  Zionism  came  not  from  the  East,  but 
from  the  West — from  the  centre  of  modern 
nationalism.  Modern  nationalism,  unlike  that 
of  ancient  peoples,  is  not  a  cultural  national- 
ism; modern  nationalism  is  nationalism  in 
the  sense  of  civilization  and  can  be  understood 
only  in  connection  with  the  industrial  revolu- 
tion and  the  colonial  expansion  of  the  great 
nations.  Zionism  could  not  have  come  from  the 
East ;  for  the  East  is  politically  and  industrial- 
ly not  sufficiently  developed  to  produce  a 
movement  which  is  both  national  and  civiliz- 
ing. 

The  Zionist  platform  is  known  to  all:  A 
publicly  recognized  and  legally  secured  home 
in  Palestine  for  the  Jews.  What  is  the  historic 
meaning  of  this  program?  It  is  to  convert 
an  unhistoric  people,  that  is,  a  people  that 
does  not  live  a  historic  life,  to  a  normal  his- 
toric people  and  to  create  for  it  all  the  factors 
necessary  for  a  national  civilization :  a  Hebrew 


39 


administration,  a  national  Hebrew  economic 
life,  a  Hebrew  education,  a  Hebrew  social  or- 
ganization.    The  Zionist  genius  realized  that 
there  cannot  be  even  national  Hebrew  culture 
without  a  national  Hebrew   civilization,   for 
the  culture  of  a  people  is  only  the  roof  on  the 
edifice  of  a  national  civilization,  and  woe  to 
the  culture  which  lays  its  foundation  upon 
personalities   and   does   not    draw   from    the 
wells  of  the  nation's  civilization.    At  present 
there  are  only  atoms  connected  to  one  another 
by  the  ties  of  national  remembrances,  spirit, 
tradition,  and  poetry.     Zionism  purports  the 
building  out  of  these  atoms,  which  are  scattered 
throughout  the  world,  of  a  national  organism 
in  the  land  of  the  Hebrews.    And  since  every 
national  polity  and  civilization  is  secular,  with 
the  exception  of  papal  Rome  and  theocratic 
Tibet,  the   function  of  Zionism  is   to  create 
those  conditions  which  will  again  secularize 
Judaism,  and  raise  it  to  the  pedestal  of  its 
anciient  glory— to  make  it  a  historic  force. 

Goluth  means :  a  scattered  existence,  and  one 
of  misery  and  affliction.  Zionism  means:  a 
national  historic  life.  And  he  who  prefers  a 
national  life  to  a  miserable  existence  has  no 
other  choice  than  to  join  the  Zionist  ranks. 


40 


DRIVING  FORCES: 
NATIONAL  OR  SPIRITUAL? 

THE  days  of  religious  wars  have  gone. 
The  Inquisition  is  dead  and  theocracy 
is  dying  even  at  Tibet.  The  modern  man,  be 
he  Gentile  or  Jew,  no  longer  thinks  more 
theologico  as  in  the  Middle  Ages,  but  rather 
more  sociologico.  The  time  when  a  given 
religious  dogma,  a  categorical  philosophic 
principle,  or  some  definite  spiritual  force  was 
the  driving  power  in  history  is  far  gone.  Law 
and  order  in  our  political  and  social  life  are 
not  derived  from  books  and  principles,  but 
from  life  itself.  Any  attempt  to  return  to 
the  status  quo  ante  1789,  is  an  assault  on 
modern  civilization,  an  attempt  to  re-establish 
theocracy  in  its  various  forms. 

In  the  life  of  our  own  people  the  process  of 
secularization  is  going  on  with  the  same 
rapidity  as  in  the  life  of  any  other  nation. 
Within  five  decades  we  have  created  a  secular 
literature  in  Hebrew  as  well  as  in  the  other 
languages  spoken  by  Jews,  and  all  the  forma 


41 


of  our  modes  of  life,  public  as  well  as  private, 
have  gone  through  the  process  of  seculariza- 
tion. Even  the  modern  orthodox  Jew,  who 
observes  all  laws  and  rituals,  differs  quite  in 
his  disposition  of  mind  from  the  orthodox  Jew 
of  the  seventeenth  or  eighteenth  century.  In 
worldly  affairs  he  is  a  man  of  his  time  and 
thinks  in  the  terms  of  his  time.  To  the  credit 
of  our  people  be  it  said  that  they  have  under- 
stood how  to  adapt  themselves  to  the  condi- 
tions of  the  time. 

It  often  happened  that  during  the  process 
of  adaptation,  Jews  lost  their  way  and  be- 
came separated  from  their  people,  but  the 
bulk  of  the  nation  has  passed  through  the 
crisis  caused  by  the  process  of  transition  and 
made  itself  at  home  in  the  new  conditions 
without  disintegration. 

Though  fanatics  have  profaned  the  tomb- 
stone of  Maimonides  by  writing  on  it :  ^'In- 
fidel and  Heretic,"  Judaism  ratified  the  peace 
which  Maimonides  concluded  in  its  behalf 
with  Aristotelianism.  All  the  hue  and  cry 
against  Maimonides  was  in  the  end  of  no 
avail,  because  at  that  time  the  deed  of 
Maimonides  w^as  a  step  forward  towards 
progress.    At  a  time  when  the  Roman  Cath- 


4J^ 


olic  Church  fought  Copernicus  and  Galileo 
no  representatives  of  Judaism  participated  in 
this  fight,  though  the  Synagogue  had  an  older 
historic  reason  to  oppose  Copernicus  than 
had  the  Koman  Catholic  Church. 

In  short,  Judaism  has  never  resisted  real 
progress  and  has  always  known  how  to  make 
peace  with  the  tendencies  and  currents  of  the 
time  without  weakening  its  own  position.  As 
it  has  reconciled  itself  to  new  conditions  in 
the  past  so  today  it  is  making  peace  with  the 
tendencies  of  our  own  time.  Separation  of 
state  from  church  and  the  overthrow  of  theo- 
cracy and  secularization  of  life  are  strong  cur- 
rents in  our  contemporaneous  history.  In  the 
life  of  our  people,  these  tendencies  of  the  time 
have  taken  the  form  of  nationalism  and  Zion- 
ism. Neither  mean  alienation  from  the  re- 
ligion of  our  ancestors,  as  many  misled  rabbis 
argue,  but  only  imply  that  the  Jewish  religion 
has  a  definite  place  in  Jewish  life,  but  cannot 
and  should  not  rule  our  lives  altogether. 

This  is  a  general  human  tendency  which 
we  should  not  and  ought  not  oppose;  unfor- 
tunately, there  are  leading  Jews  who  deem 
it  their  duty  to  resist  the  forces  of  progress 
and  to  display  medievalism  at  the  expense  of 


43 


our  people  and  its  prestige,  and  to  the  exclu- 
sion of  all  modern   and   intellectual   forces. 
This  resistance  we  find  represented  in   two 
schools    of    thought,    in    the    school    of    old- 
fashioned  Reform  and  in  that  of  the  semi- 
nationalistic  spiritualism.   The  representatives 
of  the  one  school  argue  that  we  are  only  a 
spiritual  people  and  that  we  are  violating  the 
spirit  of  Judaism  if  we  strive  to  become  a 
secular  people.     The  others  do  not  go  so  far, 
but  thej  also  maintain  that  Jewish  national- 
ism is  above  all  spiritual  in  nature  and  that, 
if  Jewish  nationalism  has  a  duty  to  perform, 
this  duty   consists  in   establishing  a   Jewish 
spiritual  centre  in  Palestine.    Both  schools  of 
thought  may  be  characterized  as  utterly  re- 
actionary, because  they  imply  that  we  should 
stand  still,  where  humanity  stood  two  or  three 
hundred  years  ago;  that  we  shouM  continue 
to  submit  to  the  law  of  the  book  instead  of 
submitting  to  the  law  of  life,  and  that  we 
should  continue  to  live  as  a  spiritual  people 
and  give  spiritualism  the  first  place,  while  the 
basis  of  present  day  civilization  is  secular  in 
nature. 

With  regard  to  the  philosophy  of  Judaism 
as  represented   by   old-fashioned   Reform,   it 


44 


suffices  to  remember  that  every  people  on  earth 
had  a  period  in  its  history  when  it  considered 
itself  a  spiritual  people.     And  to  the  present 
day  every  civilized  people  firmly  and  sincerely 
believes  that  it  has  a  special  mission  to  per- 
form.    The  author  of   "Oraisons   Funebres'' 
formulated  such  a  spiritual  mission  for  the 
French,  Fichte  did  it  for  the  Germans,  and 
Katkov  for  the   Russians.     But  neither   the 
French  nor  the  Germans  nor  the  Russian  peo- 
ple   clung    to    their    mission-theory.      While 
appreciating  these  spiritual  values,  they  have 
outgrown  spiritualism   as  the  all  embracing 
guide  of  the  nation's  life  and  have  settled  down 
to  work  out  their  salvation  in  a  very  prosaic 
and  profane  way.     Either  the  Jewish  people 
are  subject  to  the  laws  of  historic  progress, 
and  then  we  have  to  keep  pace  with  that  his- 
torical progress,  or  else  we  miraculously  form 
an  exception  to  the  rule  and  laws  of  history— 
we  are  an  island  in  the  ocean  of  life — and 
then  we  ought  to  be  today  what  we  were  two, 
three,  five  or  twelve  hundred  years  ago. 

Reform  Judaism  of  today  is  surely  not  the 
Judaism  of  the  year  1700  or  1500.  It  is  a 
modern  Judaism  adapted  to  modern  life.  The 
same  Jews,  who  are  arguing  that  we  cannot 


45 


give  up  spiritualism  as  the  prime  factor  of 
Jewish  life  and  that  we  cannot  stick  to  the 
old  conception  of  Judaism,  have  deemed  it 
advisable  to  introduce  reforms  into  a  field  of 
Judaism  that  was  considered  the  very  strong- 
hold of  spiritualism  in  the  Jewish  religion. 
That  is  where  the  contradiction  and  confusion 
come  in.  So  far  as  religion  is  concerned,  these 
reformers  conform  to  the  requirements  of  the 
time,  but  on  the  other  hand  they  still  cling 
to  the  spiritualistic  supremacy  in  Jewish  life, 
to  the  theory  of  Israel's  mission,  as  if  they 
were  Jews  of  the  seventeenth  century. 

Either  Judaism  cannot  undergo  a  change 
and  must  remain  what  it  always  was — and 
then  reform  is  unjustifiable — or  Judaism  can 
adapt  itself  to  modern  life  and  make  peace 
with  the  tendencies  of  the  time — and  then 
why  stick  to  the  fictitious  supremacy  of  the 
spiritual  side  of  Judaism? 

No  less  contradictory  and  confusing  is  the 
philosophy  of  the  other  school  of  thought  that 
preaches  spiritual  nationalism  as  the  only 
solution  of  the  Jewish  question.  If  spiritual- 
ism is  no  longer  the  prime  factor  in  life,  and 
if  it  is  no  longer  in  a  position  to  maintain  its 
hold  on  the  peoples  of  the  earth  as  it  did  in 


46 


the  days  gone  by  when  men  thought  more  the- 
ologico,  how  can  it  hold  its  grip  on  the  Jewish 
people?  And  how  can  a  purely  spiritual 
centre  even  in  Palestine  answer  the  Jewish 
question? 

Did  Mecca,  the  centre  of  Mohamedan  spirit- 
ualism, prevent  the  conquest  of  Egj^pt,  Moroc- 
co, Tunis  and  Tripoli  by  the  Christian  nations? 
(And  Mecca  is  the  spiritual  centre  not  of  a 
people  of  fourteen  but  of  a  religious  com- 
munity of  two  hundred  millions. ) 

Despite  Mecca  and  despite  the  pan-Islamic 
movement,  the  holy  war  proclaimed  by  the 
Caliph  two  years  ago  was  a  failure.  Instead 
of  a  united  Islam  we  have  today  an  independ- 
ent Mecca,  an  Egypt  that  is  loyal  to  England, 
and  an  Algeria  and  a  Morocco  that  are  loyal 
to  France.  If  Mecca  could  not  contain  Islam 
politically  and  could  not  save  the  Islamitic 
nations  from  being  conquered,  how  could  a 
much  smaller  Jewish  spiritual  centre  in  Pales- 
tine save  the  Jewish  people  politically  and 
nationally?  This  is  the  question  which  we 
would  like  to  submit  to  these  "spiritual" 
nationalists. 

These  Neo-Ahad-Ha'amists  are  by  no  means 
better  than  the  adherents  of  old-fashioned  Re- 


form;  both  cling  to  the  spiritualistic  supre- 
macy in  Jewish  life,  and  both  oppose  the 
necessary  gradual  secularization  of  Judaism. 
Both  would  have  us  stand  still,  or,  if  possible, 
draw  us  back  to  a  medievalism  that  has  no 
room  in  modern  life,  and  both  are  reactionaries 
in  the  full  meaning  of  the  term.  They  are  our 
"dark  forces"  and  the  time  seems  very  near 
when  we  will  have  to  rise  against  both  and 
overcome  them.  There  is  reason  to  fear  that 
in  the  hour  of  fate  they  will  put  obstacles  in 
the  way  of  our  redemption. 


47 

— ♦ 


48 


THE  ETERNAL  CYCLE 

EVERY  revolutionary  phenomenon  in  life, 
every  political  catastrophe,  upsets  men's 
minds  and  shakes  old  rooted  opinions  to  their 
very  foundations.  The  sudden  break  with 
tradition  affects  both  the  mind  of  the  individ- 
ual as  well  as  that  of  the  collective  body.  It 
brings  about  a  radical  change  in  views  and 
sentiments  and  often  in  the  whole  world-con- 
cept. The  gloomy  pessimist  may  suddenly 
become  a  joyous  optimist  and  vice  versa.  The 
earthquake  of  Lisbon  of  1755  not  only  shook 
the  belief  in  Providence  of  the  young  Goethe, 
but  turned  numerous  orthodox  circles  into 
agnostics.  The  French  Revolution  broke  the 
conservative  spirit  that  was  prevailing  in 
Western  Europe  and  put  an  end  to  the  me- 
diaeval conception  of  the  state,  just  as  the 
(appearance  of  Bonaparte  brought  about  the 
revival  of  the  longing  for  Caesaric  splendor 
and  the  cult  of  the  superman. 

The  Russian  Revolution,  successful  till  now, 
has  naturally  greatly  affected  the  minds  of 


49 


our  contemporaries,  and  compelled  them  to 
revise  their  attitude  on  many  historical  forces 
and  to  consider  the  course  of  recent  history  in 
an  entirely  new  light.  Men  who  never  be- 
lieved in  the  political  ability  of  the  Slavonic 
race  and,  therefore,  thought  that  Russia  was 
doomed  as  a  political  power,  are  now  admiring 
the  political  genius  of  the  Russian  people  and 
the  tactfulness  of  its  leaders.  Many  Jewish 
contemporaries,  who  considered  the  Jewish 
case  hopeless  because  of  the  terrible  oppres- 
sions directed  against  our  brethren  in  Russia 
by  the  representatives  of  the  old  regime,  are 
now  joyous  optimists  and  think  that  since 
millions  of  Russian  Jews  have  been  freed  the 
Jewish  question  is  completely  solved.  To  the 
minds  of  these  men  the  Jewish  question  will 
sink  into  forgetfulness  within  a  short  time 
because  the  Jews  will  enjoy  everywhere  free- 
dom and  liberty  and  will  live  in  complete 
happiness. 

This  is  the  attitude  of  just  those  people  who 
but  the  other  day  were  convinced  of  the  hope- 
lessness of  the  Jewish  cause  and  were  worried 
over  the  sufferings  that  the  future  had  in 
store  for  the  Jews.  This  radical  outburst  of 
optimism,  understandable  at  the  present  junc- 


50 


ture,  nevertheless  betrays  a  naive  intellect  and 
a  lack  of  historical  intelligence.  We  all  hope 
that  the  successful  Russian  Revolution,  next 
to  the  world  war  the  most  important  event  in 
the  history  of  the  twentieth  century,^  will  open  a 
new  era  for  our  people,  an  era  of  happiness  and 
peaceful  development  but,  at  the  same  time, 
we  should  never  lose  sight  of  the  fact  that  there 
is  so  far  nothing  new  under  the  sun.  There 
is  only  a  definite  number  of  forces  and  energies 
prevailing  in  history  and  each  and  every  one 
of  these  forces  has  in  turn  its  t^rm  of  domina- 
tion. History  is  only  a  continuation  of  biolog- 
ical nature  plus  human  intelligence.  There 
is  only  a  certain  definite  amount  of  matter  and 
energy  in  the  realm  of  nature  as  well  as  in 
history,  and  energy  in  history  can  be  destroyed 
^  as  little  as  energy  in  nature.  And  just  as 
there  is  always  a  substitution  and  constant 
change  of  forms  in  the  realm  of  nature,  so  there 
is  in  history.  Progress  never  assumes  the  shape 
of  a  straight  line  but  that  of  a  curve.  The  most 
glorious  period  in  human  history  may  be  fol- 
lowed by  a  period  of  decay  and  misery.  The 
golden  era  may  be  followed  by  an  era  of  iron, 
to  use  a  parable  of  Ovid. 

There  is  in  the  realm  of  history  as  well  as 


il 


in  the  realm  of  nature  an  eternal  cycle.  The 
old  Graeco-Roman  historian,  Polybius,  already 
recognized  the  eternal  cycle  in  the  develop- 
ment of  the  state  when  he  graphically  de- 
scribed this  development  from  despotism, 
monarchism  and  feudalism,  and  from  repub- 
licanism, democracy  and  ochlocracy  back 
again  to  despotism. 

We,  as  Jews,  have  too  often  experienced 
ups  and  dow^ns  to  believe  that  a  happy  era 
will  last  forever.  The  Jews  in  Spain  not 
only  saw  golden  days  of  complete  happiness 
and  freedom,  but  formed  for  a  time  the  van- 
guard of  human  civilization.  Yet  within  one 
hundred  years  the  Spanish  Inquisition  annih- 
ilated 200,000  Jews  while  the  other  400,000 
were  compelled  to  leave  the  country.  Today, 
Spain  is  again  inviting  the  Jews  to  settle  in 
the  land,  promising  them  complete  liberty  and 
freedom  where  Torquamada's  rule  was  su- 
preme. 

There  was  a  time  when  the  Jews  of  Poland 
lived  in  happiness.  Today,  the  Poles  are 
harassing  the  Jews  in  every  possible  way  and 
are  scheming  and  devising  plans  to  break 
up  Judaism  in  Poland.  In  Rome,  where  the 
Jews  only  one  hundred  years  ago  were  humili- 


52 


ated  and  depressed,  a  Jewish  mayor  dared  to 
criticize  the  Pope  openly  and  to  challenge  all 
the  forces  of  mediaevalism  in  the  Eternal  City. 
England,  that  invented  the  ritual  murder  ac- 
cusation, has  today  a  Jew  as  its  Lord  Chief 
Justice.  On  the  other  hand,  the  Jews  of  North 
Africa,  who  were  politically  supreme  in  the 
Atlas  countries,  are  today  the  most  oppressed 
human  beings  on  God's  earth. 

All  these  ups  and  downs  which  we  have 
experienced  ever  since  we  have  lived  dispersed 
warrant  a  certain  reserve  in  our  judgment  on 
phenomena  in  life,  even  when  these  phenomena 
be  of  the  most  revolutionary  nature.  Too 
much  optimism  and  too  much  overstating  of 
matters  must  subsequently  lead  to  disappoint- 
ment, to  despair,  even  to  ruin.  Our  age  as  a 
people,  our  historical  and  general  intellectual 
experience,  do  not  warrant  too  much  optim- 
ism even  at  present. 

The  Jews  are  a  force  in  history.  The  other 
historical  forces  must  take  an  attitude  to  and 
judgment  from  Judaism.  This  attitude  and 
judgment  are  likely  to  change.  The  change 
that  is  necessary  to  take  place  from  time  to 
time  is  not  always  a  product  of  malice,  but  a 
product  of  certain  factors  which  the  individ- 


53 


ual,  be  he  even  the  most  powerful,  is  often 
unable  to  control.  If  an  oppressed  people  is 
set  free,  all  the  suppressed  energies  in  it  begin 
to  pour  out  suddenly;  this  may  lead  to  the 
reaction  against  the  Jews.  The  people  shelter- 
ing us  may  often  need  a  scapegoat  and  it  will 
without  fail  take  the  Jews  for  that  purpose. 
National  as  well  as  international  crises  may 
often  affect  the  attitude  of  a  people  to  the 
Jews  or  the  attitude  of  the  dominating  class 
to  the  Jews.  In  this  case  we  will  always  be 
the  sufferers.  Because  of  the  hostile  encounter 
between  clericalism  and  liberalism  in  France 
the  Jews  had  to  suffer.  The  Dreyfus  affair 
is  still  in  the  memory  of  every  contemporary. 
When  the  liberal  forces  in  France  finally 
emerged  victors  from  the  struggle,  another 
Jewish  group — the  Hungarian — felt  the  effects 
of  this  struggle  in  a  very  unpleasant  way.  The 
Clericals  not  being  in  a  position  to  do  any  more 
harm  to  the  French  Jews  began  to  awaken  the 
anti-Semitic  instincts  of  the  Hungarians,  and 
set  about  to  create  an  anti-Semitic  movement 
in  Hungary.  Even  the  Polish  Jews  had  to 
suffer  because  of  the  victory  of  liberalism  in 
France,  for  the  Clericals  in  Poland  took  re- 
venge on  the  Jews  for  their  defeat  in  France. 


54 


As  to  the  future  of  the  Jews  in  Russia,  it  is 
hard  to  predict  whether  or  not  it  will  be  a 
happy  one.  The  mind  of  the  Russian  people 
is  still  a  blank.  The  Russian  people  have  been 
kept  in  ignorance;  their  will  is  not  domesti- 
cated and  their  mind  not  trained.  The  Rus- 
sians themselves,  or,  to  be  correct,  the  Great 
Russians  do  not  know  the  Jews.  They  have 
never  lived  together.  On  account  of  the  eman- 
cipation the  Jews  of  the  Pale  will  emigrate  to 
the  interior  of  Russia  and  will  settle  in  the 
midst  of  the  Great  Russians,  and  they  will  be- 
come active  in  various  spheres  and  fields. 

How  will  the  presence  and  the  activity  of 
this  new  neighbor  react  on  the  Russian  mind? 
Will  the  presence  of  the  Jews  in  the  midst  of 
the  Great  Russians  result  in  the  development 
of  friendship  or  will  the  reverse  be  the  case? 
And  if  a  new  crisis  should  break  out  in  Rus- 
sia, and  a  Russian  Government  should  need 
a  scapegoat  to  save  its  neck,  will  it  or  will  it 
not  pick  out  the  Jews  to  serve  as  the  scape- 
goat? Russia  is  a  land  of  unlimited  possi- 
bilities for  good  and  for  bad;  there  are  no 
prophets  nowadays  to  predict  future  happen- 
ings, especially  since  the  mind  of  the  Russian 
people  is  still  a  question  mark. 


55 


Thus,  besides  the  eternal  cycle  and  besides 
the  necessary  ups  and  downs  in  history,  we 
have  now  a  special  reason  to  be  careful  in  our 
judgment  and  to  moderate  our  optimism.  But 
even  taking  for  granted  that  the  Jewish  devel- 
opment in  Russia  will  be  unhampered,  does  it 
already  mean  that  the  Jewish  question  is 
solved?  Does  the  Jewish  question  consist  of 
bread  and  butter  and  human  rights?  Can  the 
ideal  of  a  people  as  old  as  the  Jews  be 
satisfied  with  just  being  permitted  to  live  as 
individuals?  Can  it  be  the  meaning  and  aim 
of  4000  years  of  Jewish  history  that  the  zenith 
of  our  development  as  a  people  should  consist 
in  being  permitted  to  live  among  the  people 
with  mere  civic  equality?  Is  that  w^hat  we 
have  struggled  for  during  the  centuries? 

Greater  and  more  civilized  people  than  the 
Russians  have  not  succeeded  in  solving  the 
Jewish  question.  Why  then  should  we  expect 
that  from  Russia  will  come  the  salvation,  es- 
pecially as  only  one-quarter  of  our  people  is 
today  living  in  Russia? 

The  Jewish  question  can  become  simplified 
when  we  are  liberated  by  the  one  people  or  the 
other,  but  it  can  be  solved  entirely  only  by  the 
Jewish  people  itself.    The  Russian  Revolution 


56 


means  for  tlie  Jevrs  freedom  to  breathe  and  to 
move,  freedom  from  prison  and  captivity,  but 
€ven  the  free  man  has  his  own  problem  to 
solve.  Life  only  begins  when  the  prison- 
doors  open. 


57 


JEWS  AND  RACE  CONSCIOUSNESS 

A  T  the  beginning  of  the  war  there  were 
"^^  many  who  ascribed  the  world  conflagra- 
tion to  a  conflict  of  races.  At  present  there 
are  many  who  would  either  belittle  the  role 
of  race  as  a  factor  in  history  or  eliminate  it 
altogether.  These  people  describe  the  theories 
of  race  as  "race  mythology"  and  consider  them 
the  invention  of  scholars  rather  than  facts  of 
objective  reality. 

Among  a  certain  section  of  the  Jewish  peo- 
ple this  negation  of  race  theories  is  very  popu- 
lar. If  there  are  not  races  in  this  world,  then 
assimilation  is  the  easiest  and  best  way  to 
solve  the  Jewish  question. 

It  may  or  may  not  be  true  that  race  is  a 
biological  category,  but  it  is  true  beyond  a 
doubt  that  the  consciousness  of  race  among  all 
peoples  always  was  and  will  be  an  historic 
factor  of  prime  importance.  Therefore,  it 
matters  little  whether  or  not  race  is  a  biologi- 
cal fact.  History  and  its  interpretation  are 
concerned  only  with  consciousness  of  race. 


58 


If  consciousness  of  race  were  to  be  recog- 
nized only  because  it  exists  and  has  always 
existed,  people  might  say:  "So  other  super- 
stitions have  likewise  existed."  The  fact,  how- 
ever, is  that  the  consciousness  of  race  has  a 
definite  psychological  basis,  although  we 
know  next  to  nothing  about  its  biological 
foundation.  We  see  that  the  co-existence  of 
like  individuals  in  a  definite  place  and  during 
a  long  period  of  time,  w^ho  are  held  together 
by  a  common  ancestry,  by  a  common  destiny 
and  interest,  and  the  interaction  resulting 
from  such  co-existence  produces  new  phen- 
omena and  radiates  creative  energies  w^hich 
cannot  be  simply  reduced  to  the  qualities  and 
forces  of  the  individual  minds.  These  energies 
radiating  from  the  co-existence  of  a  group  of 
individuals  are  new,  original  and  creative. 
They  are  more  than  actualized  potentialities, 
and  are  to  the  individuals  sharing  in  the  co- 
existence as  are  sounds  which  the  great  artist 
draws  from  the  violin  to  the  violin  itself.  The 
energies  emanating  from  this  co-existence 
often  assume  shape  and  form  which  differ 
from  the  energies  of  the  separate  individuals. 
They  appear  rather  one-sided  and  unbalanced. 
For  instance,  the  separate  individuals  have 


59 


about  an  equally  large  or  small  amount  of  re- 
ligious or  aesthetic  desire,  an  equally  large  or 
small  sense  of  justice  or  morality. 

If  the  energies  radiating  from  the  co-exist- 
ence would  comprise  and  express  the  will  of 
the  individuals  only,  the  culture  of  the  ethnic 
group  would  necessarily  consist  of  equal  por- 
tions and  exhibit  a  proportionate  amount  of 
logic,  aesthetics  and  ethics.  But  we  see  that 
every  great  culture  gravitates  in  a  certain 
direction.  Hellenism  tends  towards  the  artis- 
tic-philosophical, Judaism  towards  the  relig- 
ious-ethical, and  Romanism  towards  the  polit- 
ical-legal. We  thus  see  that  the  manifestation 
of  the  mind  of  the  race  being  one-sided  is  more 
than  the  sum  total  of  the  expression  of  all  the 
individual  members  of  the  race,  and  as  soon 
as  we  recognize  a  certain  psychological  or 
psychical  unity,  of  a  certain  group  of  people, 
we  must  also  recognize  that  this  unity  is  mod- 
eled and  shaped  by  time.  In  course  of  time  this 
psychological  or  psychical  unit  becomes  en- 
veloped in  traditions  and  experiences  which 
make  it  stronger  from  day  to  day.  As  in 
biology  many  think  that  the  function  in  time 
creates  an  organ,  so  the  new  energies  radiating 
from  the  co-existence  of  a  group  of  people  be- 


60 


come  in  course  of  time  something  organic  in 
the  mind  of  those  people.  This  is  the  psycho- 
logical basis  of  race  consciousness  and  since 
earliest  time  the  various  peoples,  all  of  whom 
had  an  outspoken  race  consciousness  except 
those  savages  who  cannot  count,  have  recog- 
nized or  felt  that  their  consciousness  of  race 
was  more  than  belief — that  it  was  a  psycho- 
logical resditj. 

Of  all  the  ancient  peoples  none  had  more 
marked  race  consciousness  and  racial  feeling 
than  the  Jews  and  Greeks.  It  is  very  character- 
istic of  Greek  race  consciousness  that  Greek 
philosophers,  w^hen  discussing  ethical  or  polit- 
ical subjects,  have  only  the  Hellenic  people  in 
mind.  Their  notions  of  justice  and  peace  were 
applied  only  to  the  Hellenic  people.  The 
ancient  Jews  were  not  so  one-sided.  Yet  they, 
too,  had  a  well  developed  race  consciousness 
which  showed  not  merely  in  the  religious  idea 
that  they  were  the  chosen  people,  but  in  a  very 
general  acceptance  of  the  belief  that  they  were 
a  distinct  unit.  Even  the  call  to  righteousness 
uttered  by  the  prophet  is  colored  by  racial 
motives :  "Hearken  to  me,  ye  that  follow  after 
righteousness;  ye  that  seek  the  Lord.  Look 
unto  the  rock  whence  ye  are  hewn  and  to  the 


61 


hole  of  the  pit  whence  ve  are  digged."  An- 
other of  the  prophets,  Ezekiel,  even  speculated 
as  to  the  origin  of  the  Jewish  race.  All  the 
terms,  ger,  nakhri,  ahum  and  others  used  by 
ancient  Jews  to  describe  non-believers  char- 
acterized non-Jews  with  reference  to  race  also. 
The  feeling  of  racial  consciousness  among  Jews 
to  the  present  day  and  the  consciousness 
of  the  isolation  of  that  race  are  best  expressed 
in  the  popular  Hebrew  term,  "Umoth  ha- 
Olam,'^  the  people  of  the  world.  The  "Umoth 
ha-Olam"  are  the  non-Jews,  as  the  "barbaroi'^ 
were  the  non-Greeks.  This  throws  light  on  the 
mental  disposition  of  the  Jews.  While,  in  the 
eyes  of  the  Greek,  the  non- Greek  is  an  inferior, 
bein^  a  "barbaros,"  in  the  eyes  of  the  Jews  the 
ncii-Jew  is  simply  different  and  not  necessarily 
inferior.  Even  the  term  goy,  which  is  so  much 
abused  by  anti-Semites,  means  only  non-Jew. 
But  while  the  Jew  never  held  the  non-Jew 
in  contempt  merely  for  differences  of  race,  he 
had  always  and  still  has  intense  feeling  for  his 
own  race. 

In  theological  periods  of  history  the  fight 
against  Judaism  was  perhaps  a  conflict  of 
theologies  only.  Today,  however,  a  fight 
against  Judaism  is  inevitably  a  fight  against 


62 


the  Jewish  race.  In  times  of  old  the  religious 
motives  of  Judaism  seem  to  have  been  the 
prime  factors  in  Jewish  life.  Today  the 
driving  powers  in  Jewish  history  are  not  so 
much  religious  as  race  and  national  conscious- 
ness. It  is,  therefore,  characteristic  of  those 
Jews  whose  Jewish  backbone  is  broken  to  deny 
the  existence  of  the  race  and  to  scoff  at  race 
consciousness  in  general. 

Race  consciousness  is  not  a  myth  invented 
by  the  professors,  but  a  fact  of  life. 


63 


AHAD  HA'AM 

'T^HE  sixtieth  anniversary  of  Ahad  Ha'am, 
-■-  the  foremost  Hebrew  thinker  of  his 
time,  is  a  notable  event  in  Hebrew  literature, 
and  will  no  doubt  be  celebrated  by  Hebraists 
all  over  the  world  in  a  manner  worthy  of  the 
man  and  of  the  thinker.  Next  to  Bialik,  the 
great  Hebrew  poet,  Ahad  Ha'am  is  today  the 
most  popular  Jew  among  the  Jewries  of  the 
East  and  the  best  known  representative  of 
Hebrew  thought  among  Jewish  intellectuals 
in  the  West.  His  name  is  identified  with  the 
formulation  of  the  program  of  Hebrew  nation- 
alism and  the  creation  of  a  Hebrew  cultural 
centre  in  Palestine.  Unlike  other  thinkers 
who  consider  their  convictions  their  own 
private  affair,  Ahad  Ha'am  had  the  courage 
of  his  convictions  and  defended  them  against 
great  odds.  He  had  the  courage  to  take  his 
stand  against  the  giant,  Herzl,  and  the  power- 
ful dialectician  and  publicist,  Max  Nordau. 
He  knew  that  the  flght  against  Herzl,  when  the 
great  leader  of  Zionism  was  at  his  height, 


64 


would  not  win  him  friends,  but  he  had  the 
daring  to  take  up  the  fight. 

For  Ahad  Ha'am  the  question  of  political 
Zionism  and  that  of  cultural  Zionism  as  repre- 
sented by  himself,  were  matters  of  principle 
and  had  to  be  fought  out  sooner  or  later. 
While  Ahad  Ha'am  fought  against  Herzl  and 
Nordau  and  against  the  other  powerful  repre- 
sentatives of  political  Zionism,  he  had  no  per- 
sonalities in  mind  and  fought  for  principles 
only.  The  whole  position  of  things  Avas  such 
that  Ahad  Ha'am  could  at  that  time  have  had 
no  hope  to  win  the  struggle  because  political 
Zionism  was  at  its  height  and  because  Theodor 
Herzl  was  the  shining  star  in  the  firmament  of 
Jewish  political  life.  But  disregarding  the 
disadvantageous  position  in  which  he  found 
himself,  he  fought  courageously  until  he  be- 
lieved the  danger  was  passed. 

We  mention  this  fight  against  Herzl  and 
Nordau  because  it  best  characterizes  the  man, 
Ahad  Ha-am.  Though  his  philosophy  of  life 
is  a  philosophy  of  abstract  ideas,  he  is  at  the 
same  time  a  man  full  of  life  and  temperament, 
a  hard  public  worker  and  a  political  Jew  in  the 
best  sense  of  the  term.  A  great  deal  of  his 
popularity  must  be  ascribed  not  only  to  his 


65 


philosophy  and  his  system  of  Jewish  politics, 
but  also  to  his  manliness  and  wonderful  qual- 
ities of  character. 

As  a  Hebrew  thinker,  Ahad  Ha'am  repre- 
sents the  last  point  in  the  line  of  Jewish 
thought  which  can  be  characterized  as  Hebrew 
intellectualism  as  distinguished  from  Hebrev; 
irrationalism  and  mysticism,  which  found  its 
expression  in  the  teachings  of  the  Hassidic 
sect. 

Since  the  rise  of  the  theoretical  Kabbalah  in 
Spain  in  the  thirteenth  century,  which  must 
be  considered  a  reaction  against  the  system  of 
intellectualism  as  laid  down  by  Maimonides, 
we  can  observe  in  Jewish  history  two  spiritual 
tendencies  striving  for  dominance:  Irrational- 
ism in  all  its  forms  and  Intellectualism  in  all 
its  aberrations.  Ahad  Ha'am  represents  the 
line  of  development,  of  Maimonides,  the  Gaon 
of  Wilna,  Krochmal.  The  parallel  line  to  the 
theoretical  Kabbalah  is  the  practical  Kabbalah 
which  began  in  Palestine  in  the  sixteenth  cen- 
tury and  Hassidism  which  originated  in 
Poland  in  the  eighteenth  century.  The  intel- 
lectualists  maintain  that  the  prime  essential 
of  the  soul  is  intellect  and  that  Judaism  is 
based  not  on  metaphysical  will  but  on  Intel- 


66 


lectual  cognition.  For  our  mediaeval  intel- 
lectualists  and  those  of  the  eighteenth  century, 
this  premise  resulted  in  the  conception  of  a 
Judaism  which  lays  more  stress  on  knowledge 
(Torah)  than  on  the  practice  of  the  religious 
ceremonies  (Avodah).  It  is,  of  course,  under- 
stood that  the  older  representatives  of  Jewish 
Intellectualism  were  as  God-fearing  and  ob- 
serving as  their  mystical  opponents.  But 
basing  Judaism  on  knowledge  and  cognition, 
they  maintained  that  the  first  thing  a  Jew 
should  do  is  to  study  and  accept  the  advice  of 
old:  Thou  shalt  recognize  the  God  of  thy 
fathers. 

In  opposition  to  these  teachings  is  the  con- 
ception of  Judaism  as  represented  by  Kabbal- 
ists  and  Hassidim.  These  lay  more  stress  on 
the  practice  of  Judaism,  claiming  that  Judaism 
is  primarily  a  matter  of  will  and  not  of 
knowledge.  It  is  not  a  coincidence  that  while 
among  Jewish  intellectualists  in  the  East 
(Mithnagdim)  the  knowledge  of  the  Talmud 
and  of  Rabbinic  Judaism  is  widely  spread  be- 
cause they  consider  this  the  first  duty  of  the 
Jew,  there  prevails  among  the  Hassidim 
ignorance  of  the  Talmud  and  of  Rabbinic 
Judaism. 


67 


Ahad  Ha'am  is  today  the  representative  of 
Intellectual  Judaism  as  conceived  by  his  time, 
as  the  Gaon  of  Wilna  was  in  his  day  the 
representative  of  intellectual  Judaism.     It  is 
very  characteristic  of  this  Jewish  school  of 
thought  that  a  man  like  the  Gaon  of  Wilna  has 
written  a  system  of  geometry  and  was  inter- 
ested in  mathematics  and  logic.    With  his  logi- 
cal mind  he  created  a  new  method  of  studying 
the  Talmud  which  is  marked  by  simplicity  and 
clearness.  Ahad  Ha'am  achieved  in  the  domain 
of  Hebrew  thought  and  literature  what  the 
Gaon   of   Wilna   had    achieved   in   Talmudic 
methodology.    As  the  Gaon  of  Wilna  did  away 
with  "PilpuF'  sophistry,  so  Ahad  Ha'am  did 
away   with   the  confusing  and  unproductive 
"Hakira,"  unsystematic  discussion  of  abstract 
thought,  and  introduced  economy  of  thought 
and  of  expression — a  clear  terminology  and  a 
systematic  formulation  of  principles  and  ideas. 
That  is  what  has  given  him  the  leading  position 
in  modern  Hebrew  literature. 

Ahad  Ha'am's  greatness  does  not  consist  of 
these  formal  innovations  only.  He  has  en- 
riched Hebrew  literature  with  a  philosophic 
ideology  of  his  own  which  has  greatly  influ- 
enced modern  Hebrew  thought.    Ahad  Ha'am- 


68 


ism,  as  this  system  is  called,  was  not  less  pro- 
ductive at  the  beginning  of  the  twentieth  cen- 
tury than  the  Yeshibah  of  Volozhin,  the  work 
of  the  Wilna  Gaon,  at  the  start  of  the  nine- 
teenth century.  As  a  matter  of  fact  Ahad 
Ha'amism  is  the  modern  development  of  the 
ideas  which  came  from  Volozhin.  Without 
Volozhin  there  would  be  no  modern  Hebrew 
literature,  no  modern  Hebrew  thought  and  no 
Ahad  Ha'am. 

While  the  Jewish  teachings  of  Ahad  Ha'am 
can  easily  be  explained  as  the  continuation  of 
a  certain  historical  tendency  in  Judaism,  the 
philosophy  of  Ahad  Ha'am  consists  of  many 
different  systems  and  cannot  be  so  readily 
surveyed.  His  own  disciples  claim  that  he  is 
following  in  the  footsteps  of  Krochmal  and 
that  he  is  thus  a  disciple  of  Hegel.  This,  how- 
ever, is  only  partly  true.  One  finds,  moreover, 
in  the  philosophy  of  Ahad  Ha'am  elements  of 
Kant,  Spencer,  of  modern  French  sociology 
and  even  of  Nietzsche.  The  unifying  and  pro- 
ductive mind  of  Ahad  Ha'am  has  absorbed 
these  various  philosophic  elements  and  turned 
them  into  an  organic  unit.  For  this  reason 
Ahad  Ha'am  cannot  be  called  an  eclectic.  Even 
Kant  had  his  predecessors,  was  influenced  by 


69 


various  philosophers  and  took  up  their  sug- 
gestions. 

Ahad  Ha'am  is  one  of  the  few  modern  He- 
brew leaders  who  is  as  much  European  as 
Jew,  and  who  is  not  on  less  intimate  terms 
with  European  thought  than  with  Jewish. 
Owing  to  these  facts  he  succeeded  in  Euro- 
peanizing  Hebrew  literature  and  in  raising  it 
to  the  high  level  it  now  holds. 

It  the  last  few  years  Ahad  Ha'am  has  made 
peace  with  Zionism  because  he  thinks  that 
Zionism  has  accepted  his  views  on  Palestine. 
His  appearance  at  the  11th  Zionist  Congress 
at  Vienna  was  thought  by  friend  and  opponent 
alike  to  mean  that  he  had  made  peace  with 
the  Zionist  organization.  He  has  in  any  case 
supported  the  Zionist  organization  in  its  efforts 
in  Palestine  and  has  approved  the  plan  to  es- 
tablish a  system  of  Hebrew  educational  insti- 
tutions in  the  Holy  Land.  But  whether  Ahad 
Ha'am  became  more  political  or  whether  the 
Zionist  organization  has  come  nearer  to 
Ahad  Ha'amism  remains  a  question.  The 
many  pupils  of  Ahad  Ha'am,  however,  and 
the  Zionists  in  all  lands,  are  happy  that  the 
uncontested  leader  of  modern  Hebrew  thought 
and  literature  is  to  be  found  today  with  the 
rank  and  file  of  Zionism. 


THE  TKANSVALUATION  OF  VALUES 

■p  YEN  a  language  is  subject  to  the  force  of 
•^^    fate.     Its  value  in  life  and  its  meaning 
for  the  life  of  a  people  change  constantly  with 
the  great  changes  of  life.     Only  one  hundred 
and  twenty  years  ago  there  were  those  who  be- 
lieved in  the  possibility  of  the  realization  of  the 
medieval  idea  that  a  day  would  come  when  all 
the  peoples  of  the  earth  would  speak  one  lan- 
guage and  all  linguistic  barriers  would  soon 
disappear.   Today  language  stands  next  to  the 
state  as  the  most  important  factor  in  the  life  of 
a  nation ;  in  many  cases  it  is  as  strong  a  factor 
as  the  economical  and  political  forces.     This 
is  especially  true  of  the  so-called  nationality 
states  where  the  various  peoples  can  show  their 
line  of  national  demarcation  chiefly  by  the 
language  they  use.     Today  language  is  not 
only  one  of  the  strongest  factors  in  the  na- 
tional life  of  a  people,  but  is  also  of  great 
weight  in  universal  politics.    The  future  his- 
torians,  in  describing  the  ups  and  downs  of 
the  present  war,  will  not  fail  to  observe  that 


71 


one  of  the  causes  that  threatened,  for  a  time, 
the  existence  of  the  Hapsburg  Empire  was  the 
apparently  unimportant  fact  that  the  people 
in  Germany  and  Bohemia  could  not  come  to 
terms  about  the  linguistic  barrier.  The  lan- 
guage quarrels  in  Bohemia  were  the  cause  of 
so  many  political  upheavals  that  they  shook 
the  very  foundations  of  Austria;  they  have 
influenced,  to  a  large  extent,  the  international 
crisis  during  the  last  three  years. 

Since  language  has  developed  into  such  a 
tremendous  force,  all  the  meditations  and  cal- 
culations of  the  philosophers  of  the  eighteenth 
century  about  the  possibility  of  one  language 
for  the  entire  human  race  have  proven  to  be 
empty  visions — soap  bubbles  of  philosophic 
and  humanitarian  dreamers.  If  the  living 
provincial  languages  of  small  peoples,  the 
Bohemians,  Lithuanians,  Armenians,  and  so 
forth,  have  become  important  political  factors 
in  the  lives  of  the  nations,  and,  in  consequence 
thereof,  an  important  momentum  in  interna- 
tional life,  the  so-called  dead  languages,  such 
as  Hebrew,  Gaelic,  Welsh  and  many  others, 
have  become  driving  forces  in  the  lives  of 
their  peoples  and  may  even  decide  their  fate 
and  future.     The  development  of  these  dead 


72 


languages  during  the  nineteenth  century  is  as 
interesting  and  fascinating  as  the  growth  in 
political  importance  of  such  living,  provincial 
languages  as  Bohemian,  Lithuanian,  and  so 
forth.  Most  remarkable  of  all  is  the  develop- 
ment of  the  importance  of  Hebrew  during  the 
nineteenth  century. 

One  hundred  years  ago,  Hebrew  w^as  a  pure- 
ly philological  and  theological  proposition. 
The  knowledge  of  Hebrew  had  quite  a  different 
value  from  what  it  has  today.  To  the  Eastern 
Jew,  Hebrew  had  the  meaning  of  a  holy  tongue 
only ;  to  the  Western  Jew,  Hebrew^  was  a  sort  of 
a  cultural  luxury  which  was  very  much  appre- 
ciated as  such,  but  had  no  national  value.  The 
love  for  Hebrew  in  the  West,  which,  by  the 
way,  was  stronger  than  w^e  today  imagine, 
smelled  faintly  of  a  museum.  These  condi- 
tions prevailed  in  the  West  for  several  cen- 
turies. In  the  East,  however,  conditions 
changed  with  kaleidoscopic  rapidity.  With 
the  spread  of  the  Haskalah  eastward,  Hebrew 
achieved  another  value  altogether;  it  had  a 
different  function  to  perform.  The  adherents 
of  the  Haskalah  used  Hebrew  not  as  a  holy 
tongue,  as  did  the  orthodox,  nor  as  a  theo- 
logical proposition,  as  did  many  of  the  West- 


73 


ern  Jews,  but  as  a  medium  to  spread  culture 
among  the  Jews  and  to  introduce  European 
ideas  in  the  ghetto.  The  Hebrew  writer  of 
the  middle  of  the  nineteenth  cntury  consid- 
red  himself  a  sort  of  cultural  missionary. 
The  best  means  to  enlighten  the  people  and  to 
counteract  superstition  w^as,  at  that  time, 
Hebrew  literature.  By  the  end  of  the  Seventies 
and  the  beginning  of  the  Eighties,  Hebrew 
experienced  another  transvaluation,  chiefly  be- 
cause of  the  failure  of  the  Haskalah  and  the 
awakening  of  the  national  spirit  among  the 
Jews.  The  writers  of  that  time  considered 
Hebrew  no  longer  a  means  to  an  end — that  is 
to  say,  an  agency  to  spread  culture  among  the 
Jews— but  an  object  in  itself.  People  began 
to  realize  that  Hebrew  is  not  only  a  linguistic 
theological  proposition,  as  was  thought  at 
the  beginning  of  the  nineteenth  century,  but 
that  it  is  the  woof  and  warp  of  national  cul- 
ture. The  Hebrew  writers  of  the  last  third  of 
the  nineteenth  century,  consequently,  began  to 
speak  of  the  Hebrew  tongue  as  a  certain 
culture  and  Hebrew  ideas  as  the  ideas  of  the 
Jewish  people.  In  short,  Hebrew  became  the 
national  cultural  force  in  contradistinction  to 
the  humanitarian  cultural  force  that  it  was 


74: 


thought  to  be  in  the  middle  of  the  nineteenth 
century. 

The  Hebrew  writers  of  the  Eighties  and  Nine- 
ties no  longer  considered  themselves  cultural 
missionaries  of  the  Jews,  as  did  the  writers  of 
the  preceding  generation,  but  rather  as  the 
representatives  of  Hebrew  thought  and  He- 
brew culture.  The  most  conspicuous  repre- 
sentative of  this  school  of  thought  is  Ahad 
Ha'am,  the  father  and  systematizer  of  Hebrew 
cultural  nationalism.  Ahad  Ha'am  himself 
witnessed  the  transition  from  cultural  He- 
brew to  political  Hebrew.  Although  about 
twenty  years  ago  he  was  the  embodiment  of 
Hebrew  thought,  his  school  had  to  make  room 
for  another  conception  of  Hebrew,  a  concep- 
tion to  which,  w^e  think,  the  future  belongs. 
It  is  the  national  political  conception  of  Hebrew 
in  opposition  to  its  purely  cultural  conception. 

To  the  modern  Hebraist,  Hebrew  is  neither 
a  holy  tongue  nor  a  medium  to  spread  cul- 
ture among  the  eTews,  nor  yet  a  national  cul- 
tural idea,  as  it  is  to  the  disciples  of  Ahad 
Ha'am,  but  a  national  political  force;  accord- 
ingly, he  strives  to  secularize  Hebrew  and  to 
introduce  into  it  all  the  elements  of  secular 
civilization  and  to  make  it  the  expression  of 


75 


the  movement  of  life  of  his  people.  The  mod- 
ern Hebrew  writer  would  think  in  Hebrew 
not  only  on  subjects  Jewish,  would  not  only 
philosophize  in  Hebrew  on  Jewish  cultural 
and  theological  problems,  but  would  write  in 
Hebrew  on  all  secular  subjects  and  try  to  find 
the  Hebrew  expression  for  all  the  movements 
of  life,  especially  the  life  of  our  people.  This 
striving  to  secularize  Hebrew  has  enriched 
our  national  tongue  enormously.  We  now 
know  more  Hebrew  than  did  our  forefathers 
one  hundred  years  ago.  Because  of  our  striv- 
ing to  secularize  Hebrew  we  were  compelled 
to  go  to  all  the  Hebrew  sources  of  antiquity 
and  to  find  Hebrew  terms  for  things  which, 
for  the  last  two  thousand  years,  have  not  been 
described  in  Hebrew,  because  the  writing  of 
Hebrew  was  concentrated  on  theological  and 
philosophical  subjects.  A  few  years  ago  a  Rus- 
sian Jew  wrote  an  agricultural  text  book  in 
Hebrew,  which  created  a  sensation  among 
Hebrew  circles  because  the  author  re-created 
Hebrew  agricultural  terminology.  Since  the 
ancient  Jews  were  agriculturists,  they  had  of 
course  an  agricultural  terminology  of  their 
own  which  had,  however,  been  forgotten  during 
our  Diaspora  life.     The  author  of  the  above 


76 


mentioned  book  re-established  that  Hebrew 
agricultural  terminology.  Other  Hebrew 
writers  have  produced  similar  results  in  other 
literary  and  scientific  endeavors.  A  small 
booklet  by  the  late  Dr.  Schereschevsky,  for  in- 
stance, surprised  the  Hebrew  public  by  the 
abundance  of  Hebrew  scientific  terms  and  by 
his  re-establishment  of  a  Hebrew  scientific 
terminology.  The  modern  Hebrew  writer  is 
conscious  of  the  fact  that  Hebrew  is  bound 
some  day  to  become  a  concrete  political  force 
and  that,  to  gain  that  end,  it  must  admit  all  the 
elements  of  life  and  establish  the  life  of  our 
people  as  the  only  agency  of  our  general  and 
Jewish  education.  This  necessitates  the  secu- 
larization and,  one  might  say,  the  humaniza- 
tion  of  Hebrew.  The  real  modern  Hebrew 
writers  are,  therefore,  not  those  who  can  write 
a  treatise  in  Hebrew  on  medieval  Jewish  philo- 
sophy but  those  who  can  write  a  Hebrew  essay 
or  Hebrew  book  on  scientific  or  sociological 
topics. 

The  tendency  to  secularize  Hebrew  is 
spreading  all  over  the  world ;  it  is  to  be  hoped 
that  the  day  is  near  when  a  considerable  sec- 
tion of  our  people  will  use  Hebrew  with  the 
same  ease  as  any  other  people  uses  its  national 


tongue.  The  secularization  of  Hebrew  is  a 
clear  sign  of  our  approaching  national  libera- 
tion. 


77 


78 


A  TURNING  POINT  IN  JEWISH 
HISTORY 

IN  ancient  times,  nationality  and  state  were 
identical.  The  destruction  of  the  state 
always  involved  the  destruction  of  the  nation- 
ality. This  was,  in  fact,  the  case  with  many 
peoples  whose  states  were  destroyed  by  con- 
querors. Only  the  Jews  are  an  exception  to 
the  rule.  The  Jewish  state  was  destroyed,  the 
Jewish  nationality  was  not.  Even  the  dis- 
persion of  the  Jews  all  over  the  globe  could 
not  destroy  and  did  not  destroy  the  Jewish 
nationality.  On  the  contrary,  the  diaspora 
life  of  the  Jews,  with  all  its  evils  and  troubles, 
woes  and  tribulations,  sorrows  and  pains,  only 
served  to  intensify  the  national  consciousness 
of  the  Jews  and  to  strengthen  their  hopes  of 
national  redemption.  But  the  chancellors  of 
the  governments,  always  in  the  habit  of  deal- 
ing with  concrete  facts,  did  not  take  the  senti- 
ments of  Jewish  individuals  into  consideration. 
Seeing  that  the  Jews  have  no  homeland,  no 
national  sovereignty  and  not  even  an  Intel- 


79 


lectual  and  spiritual  centre,  they  pronounced 
the  Jewish  nationality  dead  forever.  From  the 
point  of  view  of  this  now  antiquated  concep- 
tion of  nationality,  the  European  govern- 
ments could  not  be  blamed  for  their  attitude 
toward  the  Jews  as  a  people,  for  the  orthodox 
notion  of  nationality  always  implies  an  ethnic 
unit  that  enjoys  national  sovereignty,  or,  at 
least,  is  living  on  its  owm  land,  even  though  it 
may  be  dominated  by  others.  The  govern- 
ments, in  their  attitude  toward  the  Jews  as  a 
people,  followed  a  certain  principle  that  had 
to  be  maintained  as  long  as  no  substitute 
could  be  found  for  it.  Today  it  seems  that  the 
old  principle  of  nationality  has  been  re- 
placed by  another  and  that  the  present  notion 
of  nationality  does  not  necessarily  imply  that 
an  ethnic  group  must  either  enjoy  national 
sovereignty  or  live  on  its  own  soil.  The  Jews, 
who  have  now  beon  recognized  as  a  nationality 
not  only  by  Great  Britain  but,  as  w^e  have  been 
informed,  by  several  other  great  powers,  are 
still  living  in  dispersion  and  have  none  of  the 
characteristics  of  the  concrete  make-up  of 
other  nationalities. 

This  change  was  brought  about  both  by  the 
Jews  themselves,  who  for  the  past  thirty  or 


forty  years  have  begun  to  assert  their  nation- 
ality and  to  claim  the  right  to  which  every 
nationality  is  entitled,  namely,  a  national  home- 
land, and  by  the  peculiar  discrepancy  between 
principle  and  life.  The  European  governments, 
following  a  certain  principle,  refused  to  con- 
sider the  Jews  a  nationality,  but  in  practical 
life  the  Jews  were  always  considered  a  nation- 
ality of  their  own.  While  the  modern  state 
emancipated  the  Jew  on  the  condition  that  he 
emancipate  himself  from  Judaism,  modern 
society,  on  the  other  hand,  refused  to  admit 
him  just  because  he  was  a  Jew,  and  thus 
counteracted  and  opposed  the  emancipation 
policy  of  the  government.  Modern  society  is 
intensely  nationalistic  and  will  only  recognize 
those  as  its  true  members  who  belong  to  it,  not 
only  socially  and  economically,  but  also  nation- 
ally and  racially.  Since  the  Jews  are  not 
Slavs  or  Teutons  or  Anglo-Saxons  but  Jews, 
they  simply  were  not  admitted  as  full-fledged 
members  in  the  society  of  these  races  and 
nations,  and  whenever  they  made  an  attempt 
to  penetrate  into  society  by  force  and  en  masse, 
they  were  only  too  quickly  ejected  by  a  wave  of 
anti-Semitism.  So  that  while  the  states  eman- 
cipated the  Jews,  on  the  condition  that  they 


81 


become  full-fledged  Frenchmen,  Germans,  Ital- 
ians, Austrians,  etc.,  because  it  considered  the 
Jewish  nationality  dead  and  done  for,  the 
nations  themselves,  being  nearer  to  life  and 
its  movements  than  the  bureaucrats  of  the 
government  chancelleries,  felt  that  the  Jews 
do  form  a  national  society  of  their  own  and 
are  by  no  means  nationally  dead.  The  official 
recognition  of  the  Jews  as  a  nationality  on  the 
part  of  a  modern  state  will,  we  are  convinced, 
put  an  end  to  this  difference  in  attitude  and 
policy  towards  the  Jews  on  the  part  of  the 
government  and  of  the  nation. 

Besides  the  national  self-assertion  of  the 
Jews  during  the  past  thirty  years,  we  find  that 
their  rdle  as  intellectual  and  spiritual  factors 
in  history  led  to  the  present  change  of  mind 
of  the  European  governments  in  regard  to 
Jewish  nationality.  It  is  by  no  means  pure 
accident  that  two  mighty  Anglo-Saxon  nations 
and  governments,  Great  Britain  and  the 
United  States  of  America,  should  be  the  first 
among  the  great  powers  to  recognize  the  right 
of  the  Jew^s  to  a  national  homeland  of  their 
own  and  thus  to  recognize  publicly  the  nation- 
ality of  the  Jews.  If  the  ancient  Jewish  mind, 
as  it  expressed  itself  in  the  Bible,  ever  influ- 


82 


enced  a  great  race  and  helped  to  sliape  its 
destinies  and  policies,  it  was  the  Anglo-Saxon 
race  that  it  influenced.  For  the  past  four  hun- 
dred years  the  greatest  production  of  Jewish 
genius,  the  Bible,  has  been  a  powerful  factor  in 
the  life  of  the  Anglo-Saxon  race,  and  as  soon  as 
the  Anglo-Saxons  freed  themselves  from  medi- 
evalism, they  began  to  treat  the  Jews  living 
among  them  with  consideration  and  fairness, 
even  before  they  were  officially  emancipated. 

Besides,  the  American  Government  is  the 
only  government  of  the  Great  Powers  that 
never  pursued  any  hostile  policy  against  the 
Jews,  because  its  very  establishment  was  based 
on  emancipation  from  medievalism.  Of  all 
the  powers  which  have  now  come  to  recognize 
the  Jewish  nationality  and  its  right  to  a  home- 
land, America  is,  we  dare  say,  the  only  one 
that  is  inspired  solely  by  motives  of  pure  ideal- 
ism. For  America  surely  has  no  political  in- 
terests or  ambitions  in  the  Near  East  and  is 
led  only  by  the  unselfish  wish  that  the  Jews, 
after  a  life  of  exile  of  two  thousand  years, 
should  return  to  a  normal  national  life  and 
enter  the  great  family  of  nations  on  equal 
terms.  In  saying  this,  we  by  no  means  wish 
to  imply  that  the  other  great  powers  who  have 


83 


recognized  the  Jewish  nationality  have  done 
so  from  political  motives  only,  and  that  politics 
only  were  instrumental  in  bringing  about  their 
decision  to  help  the  Jews  establish  a  homeland 
in  Palestine.  We  are,  moreover,  convinced 
that  England  and  Italy,  Russia,  and  probably 
France,  which,  as  we  have  been  informed,  are 
now  taking  a  very  favorable  attitude  toward 
the  establishment  of  the  Jewish  homeland  in 
Palestine,  have  done  so  because  they  recognized 
that  the  Jews  are  a  people  in  themselves  and 
that  they  are  entitled  to  be  given  the  possi- 
bility of  living  a  normal  national  life.  These 
powers,  inspired  by  noble  motives,  now  say  to 
the  Jews,  ^^Go  and  build  up  a  national  life  of 
your  own  and  we  shall  help  you  Go  and  be 
Jews  as  much  as  you  like  and  we  shall  not 
interfere  with  your  Jewish  affairs  and  your 
national  happiness.'^ 

We  are,  however,  afraid  that  many  Jews 
themselves  misunderstand  or  misconstrue  the 
meaning  of  the  decision  of  these  powers.  If 
the  Jews  go  to  Palestine,  they  must  live  there 
with  the  object  of  building  up  in  the  country 
of  their  forefathers  a  new  Jewish  life  and  es- 
tablishing a  Jewish  homeland  there ;  they  must 
do  it  as  Jews  only,  not  as  Russians  or  Ger- 


84 


mans,  not  Britons,  Austrians  or  Italians,  but 
as  Jews.  They  must  consider  themselves  an 
object  in  themselves.  They  must,  first  of  all, 
look  after  their  own  affairs  and  their  own 
happiness.  While  always  having  the  welfare 
of  humanity  in  mind,  they  must  not  consider 
themselves  the  protege  of  a  certain  state  or 
race  or  nation,  and  they  must  not  be  under  the 
impression  that,  when  given  the  possibility  of 
living  a  national  life  of  their  own,  they  are 
called  upon  to  defend  interests  other  than 
their  own. 

No  British  or  American  statesman  believes 
that  the  establishment  of  the  Jewish  homeland 
in  Palestine  is  possible  without  the  consent  of 
all  the  great  powers,  irrespective  of  their  pres- 
ent mutual  relations,  and  as  soon  as  one  power 
or  group  of  powers  finds  out  that  the  Jewish 
Palestine  is  not  primarily  looked  upon  as  the 
homeland  of  the  Jewish  nation,  but  the  politi- 
cal stronghold  of  another  power  or  group  of 
powers,  there  will  be  no  unanimity  in  regard 
to  the  Jewish  Palestine  when  peace  is  dis- 
cussed ;  and  without  unanimity  of  the  powers 
there  will  be  no  Jewish  Palestine,  because  no 
belligerent  power  will  continue  the  war  one 
day  longer,  only  because  it  is  anxious  to  estab- 


85 


lisli  a  Jewish  state  in  Palestine.  But  as  a 
matter  of  fact  the  powers  which,  led  by  noble 
motives,  have  expressed  their  willingness  to 
favor  the  establishment  of  the  Jewish  home- 
land in  Palestine,  have  only  uttered  a  noble 
desire.  There  can  be  no  talk  of  anxiety  on 
their  part,  but  only  of  consent  to  permit  us  to 
rebuild  our  nation.  These  powers,  because  they 
are  not  led  by  motives  of  war  politics  only,  but 
by  political  foresight  and  idealism,  do  not 
want  us  to  serve  other  purposes  than  our  own, 
because  they  know  that  unless  we  look  only; 
after  our  own  affairs  we  will  not  succeed. 

For  the  time  being,  the  Jewish  people  are 
divided  into  various  groups,  each  group  serv- 
ing the  country  in  which  it  lives  to  the  best  of 
its  ability.  Today  there  is  not,  and  cannot  be, 
a  supreme  Jewish  leadership,  a  Jewish  national 
assembly  or  a  general  Jewish  congress.  Each 
and  every  Jewish  group  is  entitled  to  work  for 
the  future  of  the  Jewish  people  under  given 
conditions  only.  The  English  Jews  can  ask 
their  government  to  do  something  for  the  Jew- 
ish cause  and  so  can  the  French,  Italian,  Rus- 
sian, German,  Austrian  and  American  Jews; 
every  one  of  the  respective  governments  can 
extend  its  sympathy  and  help,  can  promise  its 


86 


help  in  establishing  the  Jewish  homeland  in 
Palestine  only  to  the  Jews  of  their  respective 
lands,  but  not  to  the  Jewish  people  at  large, 
for  the  Jewish  people  are  today  divided  into 
hostile  camps,  just  as  is  civilized  humanity. 

Our  assimilationists  in  every  country,  here 
as  well  as  in  Germany,  in  England  as  well  as 
in  France  and  Austria,  have  been  telling  their 
respective  governments  that  those  Jews  who 
aspire  to  establish  a  Jewish  homeland  in  Pales- 
tine are  disloyal  citizens  and  are  conspiring 
against  their  own  country.  In  England  and 
in  America,  where  the  governments  follow  a 
broadminded  and  liberal  policy,  no  attention 
is  paid  to  such  hypocritical  talk.  But  in 
Austria,  Germany  and  Turkey,  conditions  are 
different.  There  the  influential  assimilation- 
ists are  still  personae  gratae  with  their  gov- 
ernments, and  since  they  are  capable  of  every 
crime,  if  they  can  only  see  their  way  clear  to 
break  Jewish  nationalism,  they  will  no  doubt 
lose  no  time  in  pointing  out  to  their  govern- 
ments that  Jewish  nationalists,  though  they 
displayed  heroism  on  the  battle-field,  are  not 
loyal  to  their  countries  and  are  crossing  the 
plans  of  the  Central  Powers  in  the  Near  East. 
They  will  tell  the  governments  that  the  Jewish 


87 


nationalists  are  conspiring  with  the  enemies 
of  their  governments  against  the  interests  of 
the  Central  Powers  in  the  Orient;  the  result 
may  be  that  the  government  of  the  Central 
Powers,  listening  to  this  misleading  talk,  may- 
embark  on  a  Jewish  policy  opposing  that  of 
the  Entente  and  may  start  to  persecute  Zion- 
ists and  all  who  sympathize  with  Jewish 
nationalism,  thus  making  the  life  of  eastern 
European  Jewry,  now  greatly  under  the  con- 
trol of  the  Teutonic  Powers,  still  more  bitter. 
Therein  lies  the  danger  of  our  misconstruing 
the  high-minded  declaration  of  the  British 
Cabinet.  The  statesmen  of  the  Entente  Powers 
certainly  do  not  wish  to  imperil  the  existence 
of  European  Jewry,  nor  do  they  wish  to  have 
their  policy  misconstrued  by  the  Central 
Powers.  These  statesmen  want  the  liberation 
of  small  nationalities  and  not  their  oppression. 
These  statesmen  also  know  that  if  the  Jews  in 
the  new  Palestine  will  not  be,  first  of  all,  pro- 
Jewish,  there  will  not  be  the  Jewish  Palestine 
which  they  wish  to  see  established.  By  mis- 
construing the  declaration  of  the  British  Gov- 
ernment, we  are  implicitly  acting  against  the 
spirit  and  noble  motives  of  this  declaration 
and,  needless  to  say,  we  are  acting  against  our 


88 


own  elemental  interests.  A  Jewish  Palestine 
is  only  possible  with  the  consent  of  all  the 
powers,  and  since  it  is  desirable  that  it  should 
be  a  product  of  the  consensus  of  opinion 
among  all  the  powers,  every  act  on  our  part 
must  be  avoided  that  may  create  the  impres- 
sion that  in  the  anxiety  to  build  up  a  national 
homeland  in  Palestine  the  Jewish  people  are 
becoming  political  tools  of  any  power  or  group 
of  powers.  This  will,  in  the  end,  spell  ruin  for 
us  and  might,  besides,  endanger  the  life  of 
millions  of  our  people  in  central  and  in  eastern 
Europe.  We  have  been  told  on  good  Zionist 
authority  in  this  country,  that  the  American 
Government,  appreciating  the  present  compli- 
cated international  situation,  is  anxious  to 
remain  in  the  background  with  regard  to  the 
establishment  of  the  Jewish  homeland  in  Pales- 
tine, though  it  is  a  noble  and  unselfish  cham- 
pion of  the  cause.  We  wish  that  the  Jews 
everywhere  would  take  an  example  from  the 
wisdom  and  forbearance  displayed  by  the 
American  Government, 


89 


THE  PEOPLE  OF  THE  BOOK 

NO  one  has  characterized  the  Jews  better 
than  did  Mohammed  when  he  called  the 
Jews  The  People  of  the  Book.  In  fact,  nearly- 
all  that  the  Jews  have  achieved  during  their 
existence  as  a  people  they  have  achieved  in  the 
domain  of  literature.  Even  at  the  time  when 
the  Jews  lived  in  Palestine  and  were  at  the 
height  of  their  power,  their  achievements  in  the 
field  of  practical  civilization  were  relatively 
poor.  When  the  Jews  disappeared  as  a  sover- 
eign nation  from  among  the  nations  of  the 
earth  they  did  not  leave  behind  them  a  highly 
developed  civilization  as  did  ancient  Rome,  nor 
did  they  leave  behind  them  a  highly  developed 
science  and  art,  as  did  the  Greeks,  but  they 
did  leave  a  book  that  subsequently  became  the 
book  of  humanity.  The  economic  structure  of 
ancient  Judea  was  primitive,  and  only  the 
tribes  living  on  the  borderland  and  communi- 
cating with  the  peoples  across  the  border  suc- 
ceeded in  developing  trade  and  commerce. 
The  interior  of  Judea  was  an  agricultural 


90 


country  and  its  inhabitants  pious  and  simple- 
minded  people  without  ambition  to  create 
values  of  civilization  and  without  pretence. 
Just  as  the  economic  structure  of  ancient 
Judea  was  primitive  and  simple,  so  was  the 
political  fabric. 

The  ancient  Jewish  state  never  succeeded 
in  entirely  subduing  the  individual  and  mak- 
ing him  respect  the  supreme  authority  of  the 
State.  The  prophets  repeatedly  exhorted  the 
people  to  abide  by  the  law  and  to  respect  the 
authority  of  the  State.  This  would  go  to  in- 
dicate that,  even  in  the  best  days  ancient 
Judea  has  seen,  individualism  w^as  supreme 
and  the  authority  of  the  State  thus  con- 
siderably weakened.  We  have  no  record  of 
the  ancient  Jews  ever  having  built  great  roads, 
or  ever  having  been  a  great  seafaring  nation, 
or  having  done  other  things  that  would  testify 
to  their  creative  genius  in  the  field  of  civiliza- 
tion. 

But,  on  the  other  hand,  they  have  created 
great  books  and  have  always  been  active  in 
the  field  of  literature,  as  have  no  other  people 
on  earth.  It  may  be  that  their  literary  genius 
and  activity  absorbed  all  their  energies, 
so  that  the  literary  values  they  created  were 


91 


created  at  the  expense  of  the  creation  of  values 
of  civilization.  From  time  immemorial  to 
the  present  day,  the  Jews,  first  as  a  nation 
and  then  as  individuals,  have  been  busily  en- 
gaged in  writing  books,  and,  besides  the  Bible 
— that  became  the  book  of  humanity  and  that 
has  influenced  the  mind  of  humanity  more 
than  any  other  book  in  world  literature — they 
have  written  a  number  of  books  at  various 
times  and  in  various  languages  which  had  a 
striking  effect  on  the  human  mind  and  were 
instrumental  in  shaping  and  framing  it. 

The  appearance  of  Philo  of  Alexandria 
puzzled  and  amazed  the  entire  ancient  world. 
The  Greeks  themselves  considered  him  a 
wonder  and  expressed  their  admiration  for 
him  by  saying  that  they  did  not  know  whether 
Plato  Philonized  or  Philo  Platonized.  How 
Philo's  writings  have  influenced  the  course  of 
spiritual  development  in  Europe  and  how  they 
contributed  shape  and  form  to  the  philo- 
sophy of  Christianity  is  known  to  every- 
one who  is  acquainted  with  the  history  of  the 
European  mind.  Christian  authors  have  often 
asserted  that  part  of  the  success  of  St.  Paul 
is  to  be  ascribed  to  his  literary  genius,  his 
striking  style  and  to  the  concise  form  of  his 


92 


literary  expression.  And  how  can  we  think 
of  Christianity  without  Philo  and  St.  Paul, 
though  the  former  did  not  consciously  con- 
tribute anything  to  the  makeup  of  Christian- 
ity? 

When,  during  the  chaos  following  the  dis- 
integration of  the  Koman  Empire,  the  Jews 
disappeared  from  the  arena  of  European  liter- 
ature, the  best  Jewish  minds  were  busy  creat- 
ing books  and  literary  styles,  which  remain 
unique  to  the  present  day.  We  refer  to  the 
Talmud  and  Midrash  or,  to  be  more  precise, 
to  Halakhah  and  Hagadah.  The  day  will 
come  when  European  scholarship  will  pay 
more  attention  to  these  two  marvelous  books. 
A  famous  German  scholar.  Professor  Strack, 
declared  a  few  years  ago  that  "for  the  last 
four  hundred  years  the  European  peoples  have 
studied  the  Bible  and  have  worked  very  hard 
to  understand  it.  Now,  since  we  are  better 
acquainted  with  the  Bible,  we  will  have  to 
take  up  the  study  of  the  Talmud  and  the  Mid- 
rash.  Only  then  will  we  understand  Judaism." 
Whatever  place  the  Talmud  may  hold  in  the 
history  of  law  and  no  matter  how  it  is  valued 
by  great  jurists,  it  is  certainly  unique  in  its 
literary  style.     The  Talmudic  style  may  or 


93 


may  not  be  a  beautiful  one,  but  it  is  certainly 
peculiar,  striking  and  original  to  the  core. 
Literature  is  first  of  all  style;  what  is  true 
of  the  originality  of  the  Talmudic  style  is  also 
true  of  the  strikingly  original  style  of  the 
Midrash. 

At  the  time  when  the  style  of  these  two 
books  was  created  the  greatest  representative 
of  European  literature  of  that  period,  St. 
Augustine,  appeared  and  gave  to  Christian 
humanity  the  best  book  of  its  time,  the  Con- 
fessiones.  The  Confessiones  is  a  striking  book 
powerfully  written.  Its  style  is  both  soft  and 
forceful ;  because  of  that  it  became  one  of  the 
best  books  of  the  Church.  Wherein,  however, 
lies  the  secret  of  that  book?  What  made  it  a 
success?  It  is  the  attempt  to  imitate  the 
Bible,  just  as  Nietzsche's  Zarathustra  took  up 
the  style  of  the  Bible  and  became  the  best- 
known  book  of  the  nineteenth  century.  But 
how  does  St.  Augustine's  Confessiones  com- 
pare with  the  Bible?  In  certain  places  it  is  an 
artificial  imitation  of  the  Bible,  pure  and 
simple,  or,  to  be  more  accurate,  a  poor  imi- 
tation of  the  Psalms;  only  very  rarely  does 
Augustine  reach  the  height  of  the  true  Biblical 
style.     Because  St.  Augustine  succeeded  in 


94 


imitating  the  style  of  the  book  which  we 
created  he  became  the  literary  master-mind 
of  Europe  of  his  time.  The  entire  literature 
of  confessions  from  Augustine  to  Rousseau 
and  from  Eousseau  to  Tolstoy  has  its  inspira- 
tion in  the  Bible;  as  long  as  humanity  will 
produce  poets  who  think  in  terms  of  eternity 
and  who  feel  at  one  with  the  cosmos  they  will 
have  to  fall  back  on  the  Bible,  as  did  Dante 
and  Shakespeare,  Milton,  Goethe  and  Nietz- 
sche. 

Just  as  our  national  book,  the  Bible,  be- 
came the  inexhaustible  source  of  inspiration 
to  the  great  representatives  of  world  litera- 
ture, just  so  have  many  books  written  by  Jews 
within  the  last  fiYQ  hundred  years  influenced 
and  affected  the  European  mind.  The  books 
of  Spinoza  in  the  seventeenth,  of  Mendelssohn 
in  the  eighteenth,  of  Heinrich  Heine  and 
Karl  Marx  in  the  nineteenth  and  those  of 
Bergson  in  the  twentieth  century  were  all 
cornerstones  in  the  realm  of  the  literature  of 
modern  times.  Only  recently  has  attention 
been  called  by  the  admirers  of  Spinoza  to  the 
exquisite  and  truly  artistic  style  of  the  lonely 
Jew  of  Amsterdam.  Mendelssohn  was  certain- 
ly not  a  first-rate  philosopher,  but  he  is  con- 


95 


sidered  by  his  admirers  and  opponents  alike 
a  first-rate  writer  and  literary  master-mind; 
next  to  Lessing  he  was  the  greatest  German 
stylist  of  his  time. 

The  deep  impression  that  Karl  Marx  made 
on  his  contemporaries  we  understand  less  by 
reading  his  minor  writings.  As  an  economist 
of  genius  he  could  appeal  to  a  small  com- 
munity of  scholars,  but  as  a  literary  man  of 
rare  qualities,  as  a  powerful  writer  who  wrote 
with  blood  and  venom,  he  succeeded  in  greatly 
infuriating  his  opponents  and  enthusing  his 
adherents. 

Heine  has  been  called  by  Nietzsche  the 
wonder  of  world  literature.  The  conservative 
Germans,  the  Prussians  especially,  hate  him 
thoroughly,  but  they  cannot  help  singing  his 
"Lorelei"  and  "Die  zwei  Grenadiere"  when 
they  feel  truly  German  or  truly  patriotic. 
This  Dtisseldorf  Jew,  who  received  a  convent 
education  and  who,  according  to  his  own 
testimony,  did  not  master  the  German  lan- 
guage before  he  was  sixteen,  became  the  lyrical 
poet  of  the  German  nation  and  discovered  the 
tune  of  the  German  soul. 

Five  decades  after  Heine's  death  there  ap- 
pears a  Polish  Jew  in  the  firmament  of  French 


96 


literature  who  acquires  for  himself  the  name 
of  the  maitre  ecrivain.  The  French,  with  their 
great  literary  and  artistic  traditions  and  with 
their  own  exquisite  literary  taste,  are  not  so 
hasty  in  bestowing  upon  one  of  their  writers 
the  honor  of  the  title  of  maitre  ecrivain.  But 
they  lost  no  time  in  giving  that  honor  to  the 
Polish  Jew,  Bergson.  Educated  Frenchmen 
agree  that  even  if  all  the  philosophic  teachings 
of  Bergson  should  prove  to  be  false  or  should 
be  refuted  he  would  nevertheless  remain  a 
great  figure  in  the  gallery  of  French  literature. 
He  may  die  as  a  philosopher,  but  he  will  re- 
main immortal  as  a  litterateur. 

We  have  mentioned  only  the  principal  great 
books  written  within  the  last  three  hundred 
years,  which  have  caused  true  revolutions  in 
the  literary  world  and  for  which  most  other 
peoples  have  no  match.  If  an  historian  of 
literature  were  to  study  the  subject  of  the  in- 
fluence of  the  Jews  on  world  literature,  es- 
pecially of  modern  times,  he  would  have  to 
write  not  one,  but  five  volumes,  and  even  then 
he  would  not  exhaust  the  subject,  not  because 
of  the  multitude  of  the  books  the  Jews  have 
written,  but  because  of  the  creative  values  of 
these  books  and  of  the  influence  exercised  on 


97 


their  contemporaries.  It  is  a  remarkable  fact 
that  the  best  piece  of  German  literary  elo- 
quence was  written  by  a  Jew,  Ludwig  Boerne, 
and  every  German  schoolboy  has  to  know  his 
piece  of  eloquence,  "Denkrede  ueber  Jean 
Paul/'  by  heart.  Of  Israel  Zangwill  the  Eng- 
lish say  that  he  comes  nearest  to  Dickens. 
Hugo  von  Hoffmannsthal,  the  offspring  of  a 
Galician  Jew  and  a  relative  of  the  late  Graf 
von  Aehrenthal,  today  holds  such  a  unique 
position  in  German  literature  that  even  the 
wildest  anti-Semites  do  not  dare  to  attack 
him.  The  French  Academy  has  recognized 
another  German  Jew,  Ludwig  Fulda,  as  the 
best  German  metrician  of  his  time.  And 
there  are  such  powerful  publicists  as  Maxi- 
milian Harden  and  Max  Nordau,  such  men  as 
Wasserman  and  Schnitzler,  who  have  contrib- 
uted to  the  literary  glory  of  the  Jewish  people 
in  recent  times. 

The  Aryan  peoples  will  seldom  concede 
that  the  Jews  are  one  of  the  most  capable 
literary  peoples  that  have  ever  lived,  but  there 
are  many  signs  that  would  go  to  indicate  that 
they  are  fully  conscious  of  it.  The  French 
never  forget  to  mention  the  fact  that  the 
mothers    of    Rabelais    and    Montaigne    were 


98 


Jewesses  and  there  is  a  German  folksong  that 
beerins  with  the  verse: 


'fc>^ 


"Er  hat  wie  Borne  gesehrieben 
Er  hat  wie  Heine  gedichtet.'^ 

The  humorous  papers  in  Italy,  when  taking 
Luigi  Luzzatti  to  task,  are  always  cartooning 
him  as  a  little  Jew  buried  in  books,  and  it  is 
a  current  expression  in  Italy  today  that  "he 
eats  books  like  Luzzatti.'' 

A  Jew  and  a  book  are  nearly  synonymous. 
We  were  and  we  are  to  the  present  day  a  book- 
ish people.  The  book  has  been  until  now  our 
greatest  glory.  For  thousands  of  years  we 
have  been  dreamers  and  writers.  The  book 
was  our  shield  and  our  weapon  and  the  only 
outlet  for  our  energies.  Now  it  seems  that  a 
great  and  radical  change  is  going  to  take  place 
in  our  lives.  We  may  and  will  probably  never 
abandon  the  book  altogether,  but  we  are  on 
the  verge  of  becoming  an  active  people,  in- 
stead of  being  solely  a  bookish  people. 


99 


THE  FUTURE  OF  THE  JEWISH  RE- 
LIGION IN  THE  DIASPORA 

PRECEDING  and  during  the  religious  crisis 
in  France,  which  resulted  in  the  Separa- 
tion Law,  a  great  number  of  books  on  the 
future  of  religion  appeared  in  Paris.  The 
largest  number  of  writers  denied  that  there 
was  a  future  for  religion,  maintaining  that 
modern  economic  conditions  are  undermining 
the  spiritual  and  religious  basis  of  the  life  of 
the  masses.  A  miijority,  upholding  Clerical- 
ism, foresaw  a  promising  future  for  religion. 

A  similar  discussion  on  the  future  of  the 
Jewish  religion  arose  with  the  advent  of  Zion- 
ism. In  the  first  decade  of  our  century  scores 
of  books  appeared  in  Europe,  dealing  with 
the  nature  and  future  of  the  Jewish  religion. 
As  in  France,  during  the  crisis,  so  in  European 
Jewry,  during  the  inception  of  Zionism,  two 
distinct  views  were  held  as  to  the  future  of 
the  Jewish  religion.  One  view  saw  that  Juda- 
ism could  hope  for  no  future  in  the  Diaspora 
and  that,  if  only  to  avert  the  destruction  of  the 


100 


Jewish  religion,  a  homeland  in  Palestine  was 
needed.  The  other  view  was  that  Judaism, 
being  non-political  in  nature,  would  continue 
to  exist  indefinitely  and  that,  as  a  matter  of 
fact,  it  was  created  for  a  Diaspora  existence. 

Today,  when  the  Jewish  people  is  once  more 
at  the  parting  of  the  ways,  the  same  ques- 
tion comes  up  again.  Those  who  oppose  Zion- 
ism hastily  affirm  that  the  Jewish  religion  not 
only  does  not  need  a  homeland  in  Palestine,  as 
a  source  of  new  inspiration,  but  that  the  very 
idea  of  this  homeland  is  incompatible  with  the 
Jewish  religion.  The  spokesmen  of  Zionism 
who,  as  a  rule,  do  not  worry  much  over  ques- 
tions of  theology  and  religion,  have  so  far  failed 
to  take  a  definite  attitude  towards  the  rabbis 
who  oppose  Zionism  on  religious  grounds. 

We  think  it  high  time  to  approach  this  ques- 
tion and  to  try  to  answer  it  from  a  purely  ob- 
jective point  of  view. 

Before  we  ask  whether  the  Jewish  religion 
has  any  future  in  the  Diaspora,  let  us  see 
w^hether  it  has  had  any  development  in  the 
past. 

It  is  known  to  every  intelligent  Jew  that 
since  the  appearance  of  Maimonides,  with  the 
exception  of  the  pathological  phenomenon  of 


[01 


^^Sabbathai  Zevi"  and  of  Hassidism,  the  Jew- 
ish religion  has  not  developed  in  the  least.  The 
rabbinic  literature  of  the  last  800  years  con- 
sists mainly  of  legal  responses  to  which  nobody 
will  attribute  religious  significance,  because 
religion  and  legalism  are  two  different  things. 
The  rabinnic  Jew  has  the  same  views  on  God, 
on  the  relations  between  God  and  man,  and  on 
immortality,  as  prevailed  among  Jews  800 
years  ago.  Even  the  synagogue  and  the  Jew- 
ish ritual  have  undergone  few  changes  in  this 
period.  Many  attribute  this  fact  of  religious 
stagnation  to  the  predominant  legal  element 
in  the  Jewish  religion,  while  others  maintain 
that,  even  without  this  element,  the  Jewish 
religion  would  not  have  undergone  changes 
because  of  its  existence  in  the  Diaspora.  Re- 
ligion, like  any  other  phase  of  spiritual  life, 
must  draw  from  life  itself  and  if  the  source  is 
polluted  stagnation  must  set  in. 

Many  people  seek  to  prove  that  the  Jewish 
religion  is  capable  of  development  in  the  Dias- 
pora, and  as  proof  they  point  to  Hassidism. 
But  even  they  must  agree  that  Hassidism  it- 
self failed  to  develop  and  that  it  resulted  finally 
in  a  form  of  Judaism  which  is  objectionable 
even  on  aesthetic  grounds.    Hassidism,  which 


102 


claims  to  have  a  greater  freedom  of  movement 
than  Mithnagdism,  is  today  even  more  stagnant 
than  Mithnagdism.  In  addition,  it  is  question- 
able whether  the  pantheistic  element  in  Has- 
sidism  is  altogether  compatible  with  the  tra- 
ditional Jewish  conception  of  God.  All  in  all, 
Hassidism  affords  no  proof  that  the  Jewish 
religion  has  developed  in  the  last  800  years. 
It  would  be  no  exaggeration  to  say  that  ever 
since  Jewish  religious  philosophy  chose  the 
path  of  Aristotelianism,  it  has  been  favored 
only  with  the  slightest  development. 

One  must  bear  in  mind  that  in  the  past  the 
Jewish  religion,  though  more  persecuted  than 
at  present,  had  better  chances  of  development 
than  in  our  own  day.  The  Gentiles  surround- 
ing the  Jews  lived  a  more  intense  spiritual 
life  than  is  the  case  today  and  in  addition  they 
thought  in  terms  of  religion  as  the  mediaeval 
philosophers  thought  more  theologico.  Juda- 
ism and  Christianity  were  absolutely  separated 
and  regarded  each  other  with  hostility.  The 
intense  religious  feeling  of  the  Middle  Ages,  the 
thinking  in  terms  of  religion  on  the  part  of  the 
Gentile  masses,  the  hostility  of  the  Church  to 
the  Synagogue,  the  isolation  of  Jewish  life  and 
the  persecution  which  must  have  intensified 


103 


the  religious  feeling,  were  ail  factors  coq- 
ducive  to  religious  development.  However, 
the  fact  remains  that  since  Maimonides,  the 
Jewish  religion  has  not  undergone  notable  de- 
velopment. 

Is  it  capable  of  development  in  the  future? 

Today  humanity  does  not  think  in  terms  of 
religion;  modern  philosophers  do  not  think 
more  theologlco  but  more  hiologico;  tlie  syna- 
gogue in  the  country  where  Jews  are  free  is 
not  isolated  as  was  the  case  in  the  past,  nor  is 
Jewish  life  isolated.  Unlike  the  Jews  of 
the  past,  the  modern  Jew  in  these  countries  is 
actuated  not  by  religious  but  by  economic  and 
social  motives  and  he  has  little  time  to  give 
thought  to  Judaism.  To  the  average  Jew  in 
the  liberal  countries,  Judaism  is  either  an  un- 
welcome heritage  or  at  best  a  synagogal  duty. 
In  eastern  Europe  there  are  two  sorts  of  Jews, 
as  far  as  religion  is  concerned.  There  are 
either  rabbinic  Jews,  who  are  pious  and  naive, 
or  there  are  Jews  whose  views  practically 
amount  to  a  superficial  atheism.  Under  these 
conditions,  it  is  hard  to  tell  how  the  Jewish  re- 
ligion is  to  develop  in  the  Diaspora,  or  what 
its  future  may  be. 

The  Reformers,  of  course,  would  point  to  the 


104 


work  of  Geiger  and  Holdheim.  But  is  the 
work  of  these  men  really  proof  of  organic  de- 
yelopment  in  Jewish  religion?  Does  the  de- 
struction of  the  bases  of  a  religion  indicate 
development?  Reform  Judaism  not  only  did 
away  with  rabbinism,  but  it  would  also  deprive 
the  Bible  of  its  religious  character,  denying 
the  divinity  of  its  source  and  in  addition  arbi- 
trarily abolishing  fundamental  biblical  laws 
for  the  convenience  of  its  practioners.  Is  there 
any  intelligent  Jew,  with  a  fair  knowledge  of 
Judaism,  perhaps  with  the  exception  of  a  few 
Reform  rabbis,  who  will  maintain  that  in  these 
changes  there  is  a  trace  of  development?  If 
Reform  Judaism  can  do  no  more  than  destroy 
what  others  have  built,  it  is  not  progress  in 
Jewish  religion,  as  its  leaders  assert,  but 
merely  a  ruthless  iconoclasm. 

We  do  not  say  that  Reform  Judaism  is  cre- 
ated by  malice  or  by  the  wanton  desire  to 
destroy,  but  only  that  it  serves  as  proof  that 
from  present  conditions  the  Jewish  religion 
seems  to  have  no  future  in  the  Diaspora,  once 
it  has  come  into  contact  with  modern  life. 

The  Jewish  religion,  a  product  of  national 
genius,  can  live  and  thrive  only  on  its  own  soil. 
It  can  live  and  thrive  only  if  it  is  part  and 


105 


parcel  of  the  whole  life  of  the  nation,  because 
the  Jewish  religion,  in  contradistinction  to  the 
universal  religions,  is  distinctly  national  in 
character  and  wherever  the  Jewish  nation  is 
hampered  in  its  movements  (as  it  is,  every- 
where, in  the  Diaspora),  the  Jewish  religion  is 
also  hampered  and  condemned  to  stagnation. 

The  stronger  and  more  intense  the  life  sur- 
rounding the  Jews,  the  weaker  becomes  their 
own  religious  impalse. 

This  is  well  known  to  the  Reform  rabbis.  We 
do  not  know  how  they  conceive  the  future  of 
Judaism  in  the  Diaspora,  but  we  do  know  that 
the  only  possibility  for  a  Jewish  religious  re- 
vival lies  in  a  national  life  for  the  Jewish 
people. 


106 


A 


THE  MIGRATIONS  OF  JEWISH 
LITERATURE 

MONO  all  the  literatures  of  the  world  the 
Jewish  literature  is  the  only  one  that  did 
not  develop  in  any  one  land  and  the  destinies 
of  which  are  not  connected  with  any  one  coun- 
try. It  has  neither  a  certain  local  odor  nor  a 
certain  local  color,  and  it  has  seldom  been  the 
product  of  local  conditions.  There  are  a  good 
many  scholars  who  go  so  far  as  to  say  that  the 
Jews  had  litterateurs  only  and  not  a  literature, 
because  the  conception  of  a  national  literature 
involves  national  territory,  a  national  political 
organization,  and  national  traditions.  A 
people,  these  scholars  say,  may  produce  a  great 
numbers  of  writers  and  poets  and  may  still  be 
said  not  to  possess  a  national  literature. 
Formerly  scholars  who  argued  to  that  effect 
may  have  been  right.  If  we  take  into  consider- 
ation the  psychological  continuity  of  Jewish 
literature  ever  since  the  Jews  began  their 
career  as  a  wandering  people,  we  are  justified 
in  doubting  the  wisdom  of  this  conception. 


107 


Although  Jewish  literature  has  undergone 
many  radical  changes  (the  change  in  language 
being  only  one  prime  fact)  and  although  it 
has  been  as  restless  as  the  Jewish  people,  com- 
pelled to  w^ander  from  one  country  to  another, 
it  has  still  succeeded  in  preserving  certain 
prime  qualities  and  characteristics  which  en- 
title it  to  bear  the  proud  name  of  national 
literature.  It  is  easy  to  recognize  the  age 
of  a  Jewish  literary  document,  but  it  is 
not  so  easy  to  ascertain  the  place  and  locality 
where  it  was  produced.  The  Hebrew-Italian 
school  of  the  eighteenth  century  resembles  in 
many  respects  the  Hebrew-Spanish  school  of 
the  Middle  Ages,  and  the  Russian-Hebrew 
school  of  the  present  time  has  much  similarity 
not  only  to  the  various  Hebrew  schools  of  the 
twelfth  and  the  eighteenth  centuries  but  even 
to  the  Biblical  period.  It  suffices  only  to  men- 
tion the  name  of  Bialik  to  show  how  near  we 
are  today  to  the  spirit  of  the  Biblical  period. 

This  is  true  of  Hebrew  poetry  but  not  of 
Hebrew  prose.  Here  the  results  of  migration 
are  very  noticeable.  The  Jewish  literature  of 
the  Alexandrian  period  has  hardly  anything  in 
common  with  Babylonian  Jewish  literature, 
and  the  literature  created  in  the  Provence  is 


108 


quite  different  in  character  from  that  created 
in  Central  Asia  or  in  Africa.  In  other  words, 
while  the  contemplative  Jewish  mind  succeeds 
in  preserving  its  chief  original  qualities,  the 
meditative  Jewish  mind  was  subject  to  certain 
degrees  of  assimilation.  As  long  as  the  He- 
brew language  was  the  means  of  expression  for 
the  Jewish  literary  spirit  the  effect  of  migra- 
tion from  one  country  to  another  was  to  make 
Jewish  literature  more  picturesque  and  more 
interesting.  But  it  did  not  fill  the  literary 
mind  with  new  contents.  Sometimes  the  effect 
of  the  new  surroundings  was  not  felt  at  all. 
This  i^  due  to  the  fact  that,  with  the  Hebrew 
language  as  cultivated  by  the  Jews,  there  goes 
a  certain  philosopliy  of  life  and  of  things.  The 
fate  of  the  Jews  throughout  the  ages,  more  or 
less  similar  in  every  land,  contributed  also  to 
the  psychological  continuity  of  the  Hebrew 
literary  mind.  This  expresses  itself  best  in 
the  Hebrew  elegy.  When  one  reads  Bialik's 
"Poems  of  Wrath,''  one  thinks  at  once  of  He- 
brew poems  of  a  similar  kind  written  hun- 
dreds of  years  ago.  Hebrew  prose  on  the  other 
hand  underwent  slight  changes  during  the 
Jewish  migrations. 

Since  the  Jews  have  entered  modern  civiliza- 


109 


tion  and  have  adopted  the  language  of  the 
Gentiles  as  a  medium  of  literary  expression, 
the  effects  of  migration  on  the  Jewish  literary 
mind  have  begun  to  make  themselves  felt  in  a 
rather  unpleasant  way.  This  unpleasantness 
consists  not  in  the  variety  of  languages  iu 
w^hich  modern  Jewish  literature  is  so  rich,  but 
in  the  variety  of  ideas  and  conceptions  which 
the  Hebrew  language  imposed  on  the  indi- 
vidual. The  works  of  Jewish  waiters  who 
write  in  European  languages,  even  if  they  deal 
only  with  Jewish  subjects,  do  not  belong  to 
Jewish  literature  Mlone;  we  cannot  proclaim 
these  w^orks  as  our  national  possessions  be- 
cause of  the  very  non-Jewish  elements  which 
characterize  them. 

On  another  occasion  we  have  already  shown 
how  Jewish  historiography  and  our  history  of 
Jew  ish  literature  have  been  influenced  by  non- 
Jewish  elements.  It  goes  without  saying  that 
all  the  other  branches  of  our  prose  literature, 
as  far  as  they  have  not  been  written  in  Hebrew, 
are  strongly  influeaced  by  non- Jewish  elements 
to  a  very  great  extent.  Very  often  it  is  dif- 
ficult to  recognize  what  is  Jewish  and  w^hat  is 
non-Jewish  in  these  works.  Everyone  ac- 
quainted with  the  theological  developments  of 


no 


Judaism  within  the  last  hundred  years  knows 
how  Jewish  theology  in  the  west  has  gradually 
become  alienated  from  its  Jewish  origin  and 
come  nearer  to  a  Christian  point  of  view.  No 
less  an  important  theologian  than  Schleier- 
macher  cliaracterized  so-called  modern  Juda- 
ism as  being  very  similar  to  modern  Christian- 
ism.  It  will  readily  be  understood  that  it  was 
not  Christianity  that  came  nearer  to  Judaism 
but,  on  the  contrary,  Judaism  that  came  nearer 
Christianity.  It  would,  of  course,  be  wrong 
and  historically  untrue  to  say  that  only  in 
modern  times  has  a  non-Jewish  element  begun 
to  creep  into  Jewish  literature.  It  is  more- 
over a  fact  that  ever  since  the  Jews  have  used 
foreign  tongues  for  literary  expression,  they 
have  been  compelled  to  admit  non-Jewish  ele- 
ments into  their  works.  This  is  true  of  Philo 
and  to  a  certain  extent  even  of  Maimonides^ 
"Moreh.'^  Is  it  not  peculiar  that  all  the  great 
mediators  between  Judaism  and  the  Gentile 
world  have  TSTitten  their  philosophical  works 
either  in  Greek  or  in  Arabic  or  in  some  modern 
language,  and  that  those  Jewish  philosophers 
wlio  have  written  their  pliilosophical  works  in 
Hebrew  have  never  tried  to  play  the  role  of 
mediators?    Philo,  who  wrote  in  Greek,  tried 


Ill 


to  mediate  between  Platonism  and  Judaism. 
Maimonides,  who  wrote  the  '^Moreh''  in  Arabic, 
tried  to  mediate  between  Aristotelism  and 
Judaism,  and  Herman  Cohen  tries  to  mediate 
between  Kantianism  and  Judaism.  There  are, 
of  course,  exceptions  to  the  rule.  Nachman 
Krochmal  was  a  thorough  Hegelian  and  wrote 
his  ^'Moreh"  in  Hebrew.  But  this  is  just  the 
exception  which  proves  the  rule.  Most  of  our 
philosophers  who  wrote  in  Hebrew  developed 
a  more  or  less  purely  Hebrew  philosophy  and 
contributed  to  the  development  of  the  Hebrew 
mind  which  found  its  purest  expression  in  the 
Bible,  the  Talmud  and  the  Haggaddah. 

All  this  would  go  to  show  that  the  psycho- 
logical continuity  of  the  Hebrew  literary  mind 
and  the  true  development  of  the  Jewish  mind 
can  best  be  safeguarded  through  the  medium 
of  Hebrew.  Hebrew  is  to  the  Jews  and  to  the 
literature  of  the  Jewish  people  more  than  a 
language.  It  replaces  the  many  elements  re- 
quired for  the  sound  develompent  of  a  national 
literature  which  we  have  not,  such  as  a  coun- 
try, local  traditions,  a  national  political  or- 
ganization, and  so  on.  As  long  as  Hebrew  is 
the  medium  of  literary  expression  among  the 
Jews,  Jewish  literature  deserves  the  name  of 


112 


a  national  literature  and  is  a  national  litera- 
ture. If,  however,  the  Jewish  mind  does  not 
express  itself  any  more  through  the  medium 
of  Hebrew,  the  productions  of  this  mind 
do  not  solely  belong  to  us  and  are  not  part 
and  parcel  of  our  national  property.  They 
belong  to  the  others  as  well  as  to  us  and  prob- 
ably more  to  them.  Herein  lies  the  importance 
of  Hebrew  for  the  development  of  Judaism  and 
the  Jewish  mind. 


113 


ARE  THE  JEWS  K  COMMERCIAL 
PEOPLE? 

THE  reputation  of  the  Jews  for  being  a 
business  people  has  done  them  more 
harm  than  good,  and  has,  in  fact,  retarded 
their  emancipation  in  many  countries.  But 
nowhere  has  this  reputation  done  them  so  much 
harm  as  in  Russia.  Even  the  Russian 
liberals,  who  are  not  anti-Semitic,  seem  to 
believe  that  the  Jews,  if  emancipated,  would 
ruin  the  Russian  peasantry  and  completely 
monopolize  Russian  commerce.  They  are 
therefore  not  eager  to  take  up  the  cause  of  the 
Jews,  though  they  may  be  liberal  in  every 
other  respect. 

The  Russian  and  Roumanian  anti-Semites, 
however,  base  their  theories  of  the  need  for 
oppressing  the  Jews  on  the  belief  that  the 
Jews  are  too  shrewd  in  business  and  that  they 
will  exploit  the  Russians  and  Roumanians  if 
they  are  given  freedom  to  move  about  and  to 
utilize  all  their  commercial  energy  and  intel- 
ligence.    This  view  is  not  restricted  to  those 


Hi 


countries  alone.  We  find  traces  of  it  even  in 
America. 

Has  this  belief  any  foundation  in  fact  or  is 
it  only  a  myth?  The  question  is  interesting 
enough  to  be  discussed.  There  are  two 
methods  of  considering  this  question,  the 
historic  and  the  pragmatic.  Have  the  Jews 
always  been  a  business  people?  Are  they  today 
a  business  people?  Instead  of  answering  these 
questions  in  the  affimative  or  in  the  negative, 
w^e  think  it  wiser  to  lay  the  facts  before  the 
public  and  to  let  it  answer  the  two  questions. 

In  ancient  times — as  confirmed  by  the  Bible 
— the  Jews  were  not  much  of  a  business  people. 
The  bulk  of  the  people  were  devoted  to 
agriculture.  There  are  thirteen  terms  for  rain 
in  Hebrew^  while  there  is  only  one  for  com- 
merce. The  number  of  agricultural  laws  in 
the  Scriptures  exceeds  by  far  the  number  of 
laws  and  regulations  relating  to  commerce. 
The  attitude  of  ancient  Jews  to  commerce  was 
similar  to  the  attitude  of  the  ancient  Greeks 
to  labor.  Indeed  the  ancient  Jews,  in  con- 
tradistinction to  the  Greeks,  respected  labor 
and  despised  business  and  commerce.  Jose- 
phus  Flavins  in  his  book  against  Apion, 
says  clearly:   "We  Jewi   do   not  find   much 


115 


pleasure  in  commerce."  The  Talmudic  sages 
warned  the  people  against  commerce  again 
and  again,  and  represented  the  business  man 
as  an  ignoramus  and  a  sinner.  Rabbi  Meir 
ruled:  Trade  less  and  study  more.  Rabbi 
Johanan  exclaimed :  There  is  no  Torah  among 
tradesmen  and  business  people. 

Taking  all  these  facts  into  consideration, 
we  fail  to  see  how  any  intelligent  person 
can  say  of  the  Jews  that  they  were  always  a 
business  people.  Indeed,  it  is  interesting  to 
observe  that  the  word  used  in  Hebrew  for  com- 
merce is  not  of  Hebrew  but  of  Greek  origin. 

But  what  about  Diaspora  Jewry?  The 
Diaspora  Jew  was  not  allowed  to  become  an 
agriculturist.  He  was  forced  to  live  in  the 
city  and  as  he  was  excluded  from  all  artisan 
guilds  he  was  obliged  to  become  a  tradesman 
or  a  money  lender.  How  did  the  sturdy  agricul- 
tural Jew  become  a  business  man,  when  busi- 
ness was  never  his  ideal?  To  answer  this 
question  w^e  must  learn  the  attitude  of  the 
early  mediaeval  Christian  Church  to  commer- 
cialism. The  slogan  of  the  Church  was  "Nullus 
Christianus  debet  esse  mercator"  (No  Chris- 
tian dare  be  a  merchant),  for  commerce 
turned  the  Christian  from  the  Church.     This 


116 


hostile  attitude  of  the  Church  toward  com- 
merce had  its  origin  in  the  influence  of  Greek 
culture  on  Christianity.  The  Greeks,  as  is 
well  known,  despised  the  merchant  and  con- 
sidered him  a  necessary  evil.  The  social  status 
of  the  merchant  in  ancient  Greece  was  very 
low  and  the  representatives  of  Greek  thought, 
Plato  and  Aristotle,  contributed  largely  to 
lowering  it  still  further.  According  to  Plato  the 
merchant  class  is  to  the  intellectual  class  what 
the  stomach  is  to  the  brain  and  the  raison 
d'etre  of  the  merchant  class  is  only  to  be  found 
in  its  feeding  the  warrior  class.  Plato  de- 
scribes the  merchant  as  belonging  to  the  third 
and  lowest  class  of  society.  The  early  Church 
had  taken  over  these  views  of  commerce  and 
made  them  its  own.  Even  Thomas  Aquinas, 
who  lived  in  the  13th  century,  when  commer- 
cial life  still  flourished,  adhered  still  to  the 
early  Christian  ideas  about  commerce.  But 
as  commerce  is  necessary  to  the  existence  of 
organized  society,  the  Church  made  the  Jews 
the  bearers  of  commerce  by  forbidding  Chris- 
tians to  trade  and  inducing  the  Jews  to  do  so. 
The  Church  had  another  reason  for  making 
the  Jew  the  business  man,  The  representa- 
tives of  the  Church — fine  psychologists  that 


117 


they  were  and  still  are — knew  that  as  long  as 
the  Jew  confined  himself  to  agriculture  he 
would  continue  to  be  "stubborn  and  stiff- 
necked,"  and  no  Christian  propaganda  would 
induce  him  to  give  up  his  religion.  The 
peasant  is  the  conservative  element  of 
society.  The  tradesman,  however,  whose  busi- 
ness it  is  to  make  bargains  and  compromises 
in  his  business  life,  is  always  inclined  to  make 
compromises  in  morality  and  religion.  If  the 
Jews  were  made  tradesmen,  so  the  leaders  of 
the  Church  thought,  two  aims  could  be  achieved 
at  one  stroke.  First  they  would  be  made  to 
do  the  "dirty  work"  for  the  Christians,  and 
secondly,  their  conservative  Jewish  spirit 
would  be  broken.  These  w'ere  the  reasons 
why  the  Christian  world  consciously  forced 
the  Jews  into  commercialism.  On  the  other 
hand,  political  conditions  in  the  Middle  Ages 
actually  compelled  the  Jews  to  take  to  com- 
merce. 

Thus  a  people,  originally  agricultural,  be- 
came commercial.  It  is  clear  that  the  Jews 
are  not  a  business  people  by  nature  but  out 
of  necessity  and  by  reason  of  historical  de- 
velopments. 

But  now  another  question  arises:  Are  the 


118 


Jews  clever  as  a  business  people  and  do  they 
really  show  an  inherent  business  genius?  The 
anti-Semites  and  many  of  our  friends  be- 
lieve that  every  Jew  is  potentially  a  business 
genius.  Is  this  true?  This  question  is  also 
best  answered  by  facts. 

In  Eastern  Europe,  where  industry  and 
commerce  are  not  developed,  and  where  Jews 
live  in  masses,  the  ordinary  Jew  is  not  a  busi- 
ness man.  On  the  contrary,  the  ordinary  Jew 
in  the  East  is  a  skilled  or  unskilled  laborer. 
Out  of  the  million  Eastern  Jews,  who  emi- 
grated to  this  country  from  1899-1908,  about 
60  per  cent  were  laborers.  The  great  masses 
or  Eastern  Jews  in  America  are,  in  the  main, 
laborers.  As  Eastern  Jewry  forms  the  bulk 
of  the  Jewish  people,  there  is  no  reason  to 
think  that  the  modern  Jew  is  eo  ipso  a  busi- 
ness man,  or  a  tradesman.  The  great  Jewish 
Socialist  movement  likewise  testifies  to  the 
fact  that  the  Jews  are  not  a  business  people  in 
the  sense  used  by  our  enemies  and  by  many  of 
our  friends,  because  a  Socialist  movement  can- 
not rise  and  flourish  among  business  people. 

The  Jews,  in  individual  cases,  may  be 
sharper  in  business  than  their  non-Jewish 
fellow  business  men  of  the  same  station  in  life. 


119 


Belonging  to  an  Oriental,  passionate  race,  they 
have  a  more  vivid  imagination  and  can  see 
things  in  brighter  colors  than  the  non-Jews. 
This  is,  however,  true  only  of  individual  cases. 
The  ordinary  Jewish  business  man  is  as 
clever  or  as  stupid  as  the  Gentile  business 
man.  A  mediocrity,  whether  a  Jew  or  a 
Gentile,  is  a  mediocrity,  and  the  Jewish  medi- 
ocrity is  no  more  productive  or  creative  than 
the  non-Jewish  mediocrity.  It  is  interesting 
that  in  the  Levant,  where  Greeks,  Armenians 
and  other  Oriental  people  are  active  in  busi- 
ness, the  Jew  cuts  a  relatively  poor  figure  as  a 
business  man.  There  are  in  Salonica  great 
Jewish  merchants  but  the  vast  majority  of 
Salonica  Jews  are  artisans  and  laborers.  The 
Jews  of  the  East  when  settled  in  the  West,  be 
it  in  Western  Europe  or  America,  have  seldom 
achieved  a  great  success  as  merchants  or  busi- 
ness men. 

The  fact  is  that  the  Jew  is  no  more 
shrewd  as  a  business  man  than  the  English- 
man, Frenchman,  or  American.  It  is  true, 
however,  that  in  exceptional  cases  the  Jews 
produce  commercial  geniuses  as  they  also 
produce  literary  and  artistic  and  scientific 
geniuses.    We  are  an  old  and  relatively  pure 


120 


race  and  our  experience  is  far-reaching.  We 
have  more  productive  powers  than  many  other 
peoples,  and  we  produce  proportionately  more 
great  men  than  other  peoples.  Some  of  these 
great  men  are  great  in  business,  but  that  does 
not  mean  that  the  Jews  are  a  business  people 
and  a  clever  business  people. 


;OUE  NATIONAL  BUDGET  AND  BRIBERY 

ALL  peoples  who  live  under  normal  con- 
ditions live  economically,  that  is,  on  a 
systematized  budget  in  which  expenditure  is 
adjusted  to  income.  The  Jewish  people,  not 
living  under  such  conditions,  do  not  live 
economically.  Their  budget  is  not  systematized 
nor  are  its  expenditures  proportionate  to  the 
income.  The  lack  of  a  systematized  budget, 
however,  does  not  mean  that  w^e  have  no  fixed 
annual  expenditures,  although  it  is  true  that 
we  have  no  fixed  annual  income.  The  truth  is 
that  we,  as  a  people,  spend  as  much  as  any 
other  people  of  equal  numbers  who  live  a 
normal  life.  The  only  difference  is  seen  in  this : 
while  other  peoples  spend  money  for  national 
organization  and  on  national  institutions,  we 
have  to  spend  our  money  either  in  bribery  or 
to  help  pogrom  victims. 

On  the  eve  of  che  Jewish  New  Year  it  is 
proper  that  we  draw  up  and  take  account  of 
our  annual  budget.  The  biggest  sum  in  this 
budget  is  the  item  marked  ^^bribery."     Fe\^ 


122 


realize  how  many  millions  are  spent  annually 
by  Russian  and  Roumanian  Jews  who  seek  to 
mollify   their   oppressors   with   bribe   or   gift 
offerings.    Few  realize  that  the  many  millions 
spent  V    wealthy    Assimilationists    in    non- 
Jewish  philanthropies  are  also  bribe  offerings. 
The  Jew  has  learned  that  if  he  means  to  be  a 
Jew  he  must  pay  bribery  and  that  if  he  does 
not  want  to  be  a  Jew,  he  must  also  pay  bribery. 
When  a  few  years  ago  a  Jewish  lord  in  Eng- 
land bequeathed  his  fortune  of  $10,000,000  to 
non-Jewish  institutions,  he  made  it  clear  that 
this  gift  should  be  taken  as  proof  of  his  sincere 
Anglicism,   which  meant  the   repudiation  of 
Judaism.    When  the  French  Jew,  Meurts  de  la 
Deutsch  spends  2,000,000  francs  annually  to 
encourage   aviation   in   France,   it   is  for  no 
nobler  purpose  than  to  deny  that  he  is  a  Jew, 
and  that  he  has  embraced  all  French  interests. 
The  same  is  true  of  innumerable  wealthy  Jews 
who  give  millions  for  non-Jewish  and  often  for 
anti-Jewish  purposes.   It  might  prove  interest- 
ing to  an  economist  to  discover  how  many 
millions  are  spent  annually  in  such  bribery. 

It  is  not  difficult  to  estimate  in  round  figures 
the  sums  spent  annually  by  those  who  want 
to  remain  Jews. 


123 


There  are  six  million  Jews  in  Kussia.  For 
every  move  lie  makes,  the  Russian  Jew  must 
bribe  the  authorities.  If  he  wants  his  son  ad- 
mitted to  the  schools,  he  must  bribe  the  educa- 
tion officials.  If  he  wants  to  open  a  store  and 
obtain  a  license,  he  must  bribe  the  village  or 
town  officials.  If  he  builds  a  house  he  must 
bribe  the  building  inspectors.  If  he  seeks  a 
passport,  he  must  bribe  the  police.  The  whole 
run  of  human  activities  is  accompanied  by  an 
endless  flow  of  bribes,  gifts,  presents,  etc.  It 
is  no  exaggeration  to  say  that  every  Jew  in 
Russia  must  spend  an  average  of  ten  rubles 
annually  in  bribing  officials.  This  is  60,000,000 
rubles,  or  $30,000,000  a  year.  The  total  budget 
of  the  Swiss  Confederacy  falls  within  this 
amount.  In  return  the  Russian  Jews  are  paid 
in  exceptional  laws  and  pogroms.  These  laws 
and  progroms  lead  to  emigration  which  costs 
us,  on  an  average,  |10,000,000  a  year. 

In  the  last  decade  Jewish  emigration  from 
Russia  has  been  at  least  100,000  persons  a 
year.  The  cost  to  every  immigrant  is  at  least 
120  rubles.  This  totals  |7,200,000  a  year. 
Economists  have  calculated  and  discovered 
that  the  incidental  expenses  of  each  immigrant 
amount  to  about  100  rubles.    These  expenses 


124 


are  caused  by  the  loss  entailed  in  breaking  up 
business,  selling  out  below  cost,  etc.  This  iu 
turn  totals  up  to  12,000,000  rubles,  or  $6,000,- 
000  a  year.  In  addition  to  these  sums  there 
are  extraordinary  losses  resulting  from  pog- 
roms, fire  and  boycott. 

We  are  not  taking  into  consideration  the 
hundreds  of  millions  lost  by  Jews  in  the  war 
owing  to  the  malice  of  the  Russian  Govern- 
ment. These  losses  are  not  recurrent.  But 
we  must  consider  the  losses  of  the  Jews  in 
Kussia  as  a  result  of  pogroms.  In  the  pog- 
roms of  1905  and  1906  the  Russian  Jews  lost 
20,000,000  rubles.  Pogroms  on  a  minor  scale 
are  yearly  events  in  Russia.  All  in  all,  the 
sum  which  the  Russian  Jews  spend  annually 
in  bribes  or  in  expenses  in  connection  with 
emigration,  or  which  they  lose  in  pogroms  or 
other  upheavals,  reaches  the  gigantic  sum  of 
$50,000,000,  a  sum  which  exceeds  the  annual 
budget  of  Bulgaria  or  of  Switzerland.  For 
less  than  this  sum  these  two  peoples  enjoy 
national  independence  and  sovereignty  while 
we  enjoy — pogroms. 

What  is  true  of  Russia  is  true  of  Roumania, 
partly  true  of  Galicia  and  of  the  Jews  in 
northern    Africa,    Persia    and    Afghanistan. 


12S 


That  these  million  and  a  half  of  oppressed 
Jews  living  outside  of  Kussia  also  spend 
millions  annually  in  bribery  and  emigration 
goes  without  saying. 

As  the  emigration  from  the  countries  of  op- 
pression does  not  diminish  the  number  of  Jews, 
because  of  the  high  birth-rate  there,  and  as 
conditions  of  life  grow  worse  daily,  the  emi- 
grants have  to  support  their  families  and 
friends  who  stay  behind.  The  Russian  Min- 
istry of  Post  and  Telegraph  published  statisti- 
cal tables  a  few  years  ago,  which  show  that  the 
Russian  immigrants  in  the  United  States, 
mostly  Jews,  send  annually  to  their  relatives 
and  friends  from  |15,000,000  to  $18,000,000 
a  year.  A  good  part  of  this  sum  goes  to  the 
Russian  postoffice  officials.  This  fact  became 
known  four  years  ago  when  a  group  of  Jews 
in  Petrograd  and  Moscow  started  a  movement 
with  the  purpose  of  founding  a  Jewish  immi- 
grants' bank. 

When  speaking  of  necessary  and  incidental 
expenses  of  immigration  one  must  not  over- 
look the  losses  accruing  from  re-immigration 
and  from  a  decrease  of  productive  energy  of 
many  immigrants  because  of  their  inability  to 
adapt  themselves  to  new  surroundings. 


126 


These  are  expenses  caused  by  the  decision 
of  Jews  to  remain  Jews.  We  maintain  that 
the  sums  of  money  paid  by  Jews  who  are  de- 
termined to  have  the  world  think  them  non- 
Jews,  or  to  have  the  world  forgive  them  for 
being  Jews,  are  at  least  as  large. 

When,  a  few  years  ago,  the  Jewish  million- 
aire Efrussi  died  in  Paris,  the  French  press 
without  exception  paid  high  tribute  to  his 
French  patriotism  and  omitted  all  mention  of 
his  Jewish  origin.  Efrussi  used  to  spend 
2,000,000  francs  on  French  national  sports, 
races,  etc.  This  was  also  the  case  with  the 
French  Jew,  Osiris,  who  left  his  fortune  of 
60,000,000  francs  to  the  French  people  and 
French  institutions,  and  60,000  francs  to  the 
Jewish  people  in  the  form  of  a  copy  of 
Michael  Angelo's  Moses  erected  in  the  court 
of  the  Jewish  Teachers^  Seminary  of  the  Al- 
liance Israelite  in  Paris.  An  Austrian  Jew, 
Taussig,  gave  1,000,000  kronen  to  the  Catholic 
Eucharist  Congress  in  Vienna,  while  a  relative 
of  the  same  name  left  500,000  kronen  to  the 
Catholic  church  with  the  request  that  on  his 
Jahr-Zeit  two  Franciscan  monks  visit  the 
synagogue  to  pray  for  his  soul.  The  new  uni- 
versity in  Frankfort-on-Main,  which  cost  many 


127 


million  marks,  is  a  Jewish  university  in  so  far 
as  large  parts  of  this  sum  were  contributed 
by  Jews.  Most  of  the  contributors  were  Jews 
w^ho  in  no  way  support  Jewish  institutions.  A 
Prussian  statistician  discovered  a  few  years 
ago  that  not  only  do  Jews  contribute  to  funds 
for  the  building  of  monuments  to  national 
heroes,  but  also  to  funds  for  Catholic  cathe- 
drals and  other  institutions  that  are  anti- 
Semitic  in  character. 

In  England  there  are  hundreds  of  wealthy 
Jews  who  make  annual  contributions  to  the 
Church  of  England,  refusing  at  the  same  time 
to    support    any    Jewish    institutions.      Lord 
Eothschild,  who   is  by  no  means  the  richest 
man  in  England,  spends  more  in  New  Year's 
gifts  to  various  non-Jewish  classes  in  London 
than  ten  other  rich  lords  combined.     Another 
English  Jew,  Sir  Ernest  Cassel,  the  son  of  a 
Hebrew  teacher  in  Germany,  has  spent  in  the 
last  decade  £1,500,000  in  the  support  of  non- 
Jewish   institutions.     Their  contributions  to 
Jewish  institutions  have  been  insignificant  in 
comparison. 

The  gift  of  these  large  sums  is  always  made 
public,  but  the  sum  total  of  smaller  gifts,  which 
are  not  made  public,  exceed  by  far  the  amounts 


128 


given  by  very  rich  Jews  to  non-Jewish  institu- 
tions. If  we  compare  the  sums  given  by  so- 
called  Jewish  philanthropists  to  Jewish  and 
non-Jewish  institutions  we  discover  that  they 
give  at  least  five  times  as  generously  to  the 
non-Jewish  as  to  the  Jewish.  Mr.  Jacob  H. 
Schiff's  gift  of  $500,000  to  Barnard  College  is 
a  striking  instance.  At  a  time  when  his  own 
people  experienced  the  greatest  calamity  in  its 
history,  when  millions  of  Jews  were  starving, 
and  when  Jewish  blood  was  being  shed  freely, 
Schiff  gave  $100,000  for  Jewish  relief  purposes 
and  five  times  as  much  to  a  single  institution 
for  the  erection  of  one  building  in  New  York. 
This  is  the  usual  proportion  that  marks  the 
giving  of  Jews  to  Jewish  and  non-Jewish  in- 
stitutions. 

We  think  that  the  form  of  bribery  which  the 
oppressed  Jews  practice  to  mollify  their  op- 
pressors is  sad  enough  as  a  commentary  on 
Jewish  life.  But  the  more  ostentatious  form  of 
bribery — a  form  of  gift  bestowal  which  seeks 
to  hide  the  giver's  identity  as  a  Jew  or  at  least 
to  purchase  pardon  for  his  Jewishness — is  the 
greater  tragedy.  These  Jews  spend  millions 
to  make  the  world  forget  they  are  Jews,  but 
the  world  remembers  and  laughs  up  its  sleeve. 


129 


THE  TKUE   MEANING  OF  JEWISH 
UNIVERSALISM 

IN  the  course  of  the  long  controversy  be- 
tween Jewish  nationalists  and  opponents 
of  Jewish  nationalism  many  have  come  to  be- 
lieve that  those  who  oppose  nationalism  stand 
for  universal  Judaism,  especially  since  the 
anti-nationalists  call  themselves  Jewish  uni- 
versalists.  After  the  publication  of  the  declar- 
ation of  the  British  Government  with  regard 
to  Palestine  the  main  anti-nationalistic 
spokesman  in  America,  Dr.  Philipson  of  Cin- 
cinnati, summed  up  his  negative  attitude  to 
Zionism  with  the  short  sentence,  ^^I  stand  by 
my  Jewish  universalism."  One  even  hears 
people  from  the  radical  camp  of  the  left  pro- 
claiming their  Jewish  universalism.  The 
impression  has  thus  been  created  that  while 
the  nationalists  stand  for  a  petty,  provincial 
conception  of  Judaism,  they,  the  anti-nation- 
alists, advocate  a  broad-minded  universalism. 
We  deem  it  opportune  to  examine  this 
Jewish  universalism,  which  is  played  up  to- 


130 


day  against  the  nationalistic  efforts  of  our 
people  to  re-establish  a  Homeland  in  Palestine 
and  to  see  how  far  it  is  sincere  in  its  motives 
and  compatible  with  Jewish  tradition,  and 
how  far  it  is  intellectual  camouflage.  We 
think  it  rather  curious  that  those  who  claim  to 
be  Jewish  universalists — the  radical  Reform 
rabbis  and  assimilationists  from  other  camps 
— always  lay  stress  on  American,  German, 
French  or  English  Judaism,  and  often  speak 
of  the  American  Jewish  Church  or  the  English 
Jewish  Church,  and  so  forth.  It  is  also  remark- 
able that  these  Jewish  universalists  have 
always  worked  for  a  "readjustment"  of 
Judaism  to  local  conditions  and  have  tried  to 
Americanize  Judaism  in  America,  to  Ger- 
manize it  in  Germany,  to  Anglicize  it  in  Eng- 
land, to  Magyarize  it  in  Hungary,  and  so  forth. 
On  the  other  hand,  those  who  were  con- 
sidered as  standing  for  a  petty,  provincial  con- 
ception of  Judaism,  the  nationalists,  have  not 
only  never  tried  to  do  anything  of  the  sort  but 
have  always  defended  the  interritoriality  and 
catholicity  of  Judaism.  One  never  hears  a 
Jewish  nationalist  here  or  abroad  speaking  of 
an  American  Jewish  Church  or  an  English 
Jewish  Church,  and  so  forth.  It  seems  to  us 
that  in  view  of  these  facts  the  sort  of  universal 


ISl 


Judaism  as  proclaimed  by  the  assimilationists 
is  of  rather  doubtful  origin  and  character 
and  that  it  is  everything  but  universal,  for 
it  is  territorial  and  provincial  to  the  core. 
As  a  matter  of  fact,  Reform  Judaism  as 
established  by  the  Reform  rabbis  in  the 
middle  of  the  nineteenth  century,  and  de- 
veloped by  American  rabbis  at  the  end  of  the 
nineteenth  century  and  the  beginning  of  the 
twentieth,  is  the  first  gigantic  attempt  to 
break  the  Catholicism  of  Judaism  and  to  ter- 
ritorialize it,  that  is  to  say,  to  annihilate  its 
organic  unity.  Reform  Judaism  is  in  fact 
nothing  else  but  territorialism  in  religious 
terms,  just  as  Yiddishism  is  a  territorialism  in 
linguistic  terms.  Those  who  divide  Judaism 
geographically  and  claim  that  each  part  has 
little  or  nothing  to  do  with  the  other,  and  that 
each  part  is  organically  connected  only  with 
its  surroundings,  that  there  is  such  a  thing  as 
American  Judaism,  English  Judaism,  German 
Judaism,  French  Judaism,  and  so  on,  stand 
for  the  same  policy  as  do  the  Yiddishists,  who 
divide  the  Jewish  people  into  ten  or  fifteen 
separate  groups,  claiming  that  every  group  is 
a  unit  by  itself  and  has  nothing  to  do  with 
the    others.      According    to    Yiddishists    the 


132 


Ladino-speaking  Jew  lias  scarcely  anything  in 
common  with  the  Judeo-German-speaking 
Jew,  just  as  the  Arabic  or  Greek-speaking 
Jews  have  little  or  nothing  in  common  with 
the  Ladino  or  Yiddish-speaking  Jews.  Some 
express  their  Jewish  territorialism  and  pro- 
vincialism in  terms  of  religion,  the  others 
in  terms  of  language.  Both  are  opponents  of 
Jewish  unity  and  Jewish  Catholicism,  both  are 
opposed  to  traditional  Judaism,  both  are  op- 
posed to  Jewish  nationalism  that  is  organically 
connected  with  Hebrew,  and  both  are,  of 
course,  opposed  to  a  Hebrew  Palestine. 

Why  these  people,  who,  as  we  have  seen, 
stand  for  territorialistic  Judaism  instead  of 
universal,  should  call  themselves  Jewish  uni- 
versalists,  we  are  at  a  loss  to  understand.  The 
fact  that  their  notion  of  God  is  as  colorless 
and  pale  as  that  of  the  Unitarians,  and  the  fact 
that  their  conception  of  ethics,  especially  of 
Jewish  ethics,  is  as  bloodless  and  vague  as  that 
of  the  rationalists  of  the  eighteenth  century, 
gives  them  scarcely  any  right  to  call  them- 
selves Jewish  universalists  and  to  assert  that 
they  stand  for  universal  Judaism.  Our  only 
consolation  is  that  this  sort  of  territorialistic 
Judaism  that  goes  under  the  false  mark  of 


133i 


universal  Judaism  is  not  the  invention  of  the 
Keform  rabbis,  nor  that  of  the  Yiddishists,  but 
is  as  old  as  Judaism  itself.  All  who  have 
carefully  paged  the  history  of  our  people 
know  that  there  always  was  a  Jewish  min- 
ority from  time  immemorial  that  stood  for  a 
territorialistic  Judaism,  and  if  there  is  any 
difference  in  principle  between  the  Judeans 
and  Israelites  this  difference  consists  in  that 
the  Judeans  always  stood  for  universal  Juda- 
ism, while  the  Israelites  stood  for  a  territorial- 
istic Judaism.  The  Judeans  were  what  the 
nationalists  are  to-day — traditional,  conserva- 
tive and  nationalistic,  while  the  Israelites 
were  reformers,  assimilationists  and  territor- 
ialists.  The  Judeans  advocated  a  Palestinian 
and  Hebrew  Judaism,  while  the  Israelites 
always  opposed  it  and  were  satisfied  even  with, 
the  Temple  outside  of  Palestine. 

The  first  radical  reformer,  assimilationist 
and  territorialist  was  not  Abraham  Geiger, 
but  Jeroboam  Ben  Nebat.  The  Judeans,  ad- 
vocating a  Palestinian  and  Hebrew  Judaism, 
produced  the  true,  great  prophets,  the  prophets 
of  truth  and  justice,  while  the  Israelites  pro- 
duced the  false  prophets,  who  misled  the  peo- 
ple and  displayed  religious  and  moral  camou- 


134 


flage.  The  notion  of  a  universal  God,  of  a 
universal  morality  and  of  the  brotherhood  of 
man,  the  fundamental  teachings  of  Jewish  uni- 
versalism,  have  not  been  created  by  the  proph- 
ets of  the  Israelites,  the  false  universalists,  but 
by  the  prophets  of  Judea,  the  nationalistic 
prophets.  These  great  nationalistic  prophets, 
who  alone  made  Judaism  that  tremendous 
force  in  history  and  who,  by  their  genius, 
secured  immortality  for  our  religion  and 
ethics,  must  turn  in  their  grave  when  they  hear 
the  false  prophets  of  to-day  claiming  them  as 
their  witnesses.  The  teachings  of  our  great 
prophets  have  been  distorted  and  falsified  by 
many  of  our  enemies  and  opponents,  but  none 
has  falsified  and  distorted  them  more  than  the 
representatives  of  the  so-called  universal  Juda- 
ism of  to-day,  because  our  great  prophets,  who 
were  at  the  same  time  great  Jewish  statesmen, 
taught  the  doctrine  of  the  indestructible  Jew- 
ish nation  and  the  immortality  of  our  people 
as  a  people,  and  they  were  so  extreme  in  their 
nationalism  and  nationalistic  conception  of 
Judaism  that  they  dreamt  of  the  Jewish 
nation  to  be  the  glory  of  all  the  peoples  of  the 
earth  and  the  center  of  all  that  is  good  and 
great  and  beautiful  in  humanity. 


1S5 


We  doubt  whether  there  are  many  Jewish 
nationalists  today  whose  nationalistic  feelings 
run  as  high  as  did  those  of  our  great  prophets 
whom  Jewish  universalists  claim  as  their  chief 
witnesses  for  their  falsified  Judaism.  It  was  the 
great  Hebrew  prophets  of  old  who  first  fought 
against  territorializing  Judaism  and  who 
fought  against  the  attempt  to  Yiddishize  it  in 
one  form  or  another.  They  all  stood  for  the 
pure,  traditional,  Palestinian  and  Hebrew 
Judaism.  They  were  bitter  against  Ephraim, 
because  Ephraim  stood  for  what  the  Israelites 
stand  for  today:  "Ubi  bene,  ibi  patria" — 
Where  I  do  well  there  is  my  fatherland. 

That  the  Judeans  and  not  the  Israelites 
were  right  in  their  conception  of  Judaism  can 
be  seen  from  the  fate  of  both.  Israel  disap- 
peared, swept  away  by  the  storm  of  history, 
while  Judea  remained.  It  is  only  a  pity  that 
all  of  the  Israelites  did  not  disappear  also  for, 
if  they  did,  we  would  have  no  Israelites  today 
in  our  midst,  and  God  knows  that  the  Israelites 
of  today  are  unnecessary  Jews  and  that  those 
who  claim  a  mission  for  Israel  have  no  mission 
at  all.  The  Jewish  universalism  advocated 
today  by  all  those  who  stand  for  the  disinte- 
gration and  deterioration  of  Judaism  is  not 


1S6 


universalism,  and  if  its  advocates  are  any- 
thing, they  are  Jewish  nihilists,  because  Juda- 
ism is  nihil  to  them — no  people,  no  race,  no 
nation,  noi  religion,  no  tradition,  but 


137 


THE  BURDEN  OF  TEADITION 

THE  phenomenal  tempo  made  by  the 
United  States  in  preparation  for  the 
war  is  a  very  interesting  phenomenon  of  our 
time.  What  England  did  in  many  years  of 
struggle  America  has  achieved  within  a  few 
weeks.  It  took  England  more  than  a  year  and 
a  half  before  she  saw  her  way  clear  to  resort 
to  compulsory  service,  and  it  required  many 
weary  months  to  organize  the  administrative 
branch  of  the  war  service  and  to  place  the 
country  on  a  solid  war  footing.  Even  coun- 
tries with  long  military  traditions,  such  as 
France,  Italy,  Austria,  and  even  Germany, 
had  to  struggle  long  before  they  were  in  the 
war  with  both  feet.  America,  though  unmili- 
taristic,  did  all  that  within  a  very  short  time. 
Over  night  there  was  a  national  army  in 
America.  The  economic  life  of  the  country 
adapted  itself  to  war  conditions,  and  every- 
thing to  conduct  a  war  on  an  unheard-of 
scale  was  created  within  a  few  months.  That 
a  non-militaristic  country  like  America  could 


138 


adapt  itself  to  war  conditions  within  such  a 
short  time  must  puzzle  every  observer,  and  it 
wdll  be  a  puzzle  to  the  historian  of  the  future, 
also,  unless  he  recognizes  the  touchstone  of 
American  genius  as  displayed  at  present. 
This  touchstone  is  the  absence  of  long  his- 
torical traditions. 

We  Jews,  who  are  preparing  ourselves  to 
start  a  new  life  as  a  nation,  ought  to  learn  in 
this  respect.  We  have  old  traditions  of  our 
own  and  we  are  burdened  with  a  great  many 
non-Jewish  traditions  in  addition,  for  we  have 
lived  in  the  last  two  thousand  years  in  the 
Diaspora  and  among  those  people  whose  life 
has  been  shaped  by  thoughts  and  the  spirit  of 
ancient  Kome.  The  European  state  that  Is 
to-day  undergoing  a  crisis  as  never  before  is 
the  inheritance  of  old  Kome.  The  entire  sys- 
tem of  European  politics  is  Roman  in  origin. 
International  political  relations  can  be  traced 
to  ancient  Roman  origin.  A  comparison  be- 
tween the  history  of  the  international  rela- 
tions of  ancient  Rome  and  that  of  any  Euro- 
pean state  during  the  last  five  hundred  years 
will  clearly  show  that  the  international  politi- 
cal movements  in  Europe  for  the  last  centuries 
have  their  parallel  in  international  political 


139 


movements  of  ancient  Rome.  All  the  severe 
criticisms  leveled  by  Montesquieu  against 
ancient  Rome  are  still  timely  to-day.  All 
branches  of  the  activities  of  the  European 
state,  civil  administrations,  jurisdiction,  mat- 
ters military,  foreign  affairs,  and  so  on,  are 
more  or  less  remnants  of  ancient  Roman  civil- 
ization. 

In  short,  we  have  to  be  conscious  of  the  fact 
that  the  life  of  the  Jewish  people  in  Europe  was 
lived  amid  a  system  of  Roman  civilization. 
The  old  Jewish  preachers,  who  characterized 
our  present  Diaspora  life  as  Goluth-Rome, 
knew  what  they  were  talking  about,  though 
they  could  not  exactly  explain  why  they 
characterized  our  present  Goluth  as  Roman  in 
nature.  Since  we  have  lived  for  two  thousand 
years  in  this  system  of  civilization,  it  goes 
without  saying  that  we  have  been  greatly  influ- 
enced by  it  and  that  we  ourselves  are  definitely 
subject  to  Roman  traditions  in  addition  to 
our  own.  Traditions  sometimes  strengthen  a 
nation,  but  they  also  may  weaken  it.  The 
most  traditional  people  in  the  world,  the 
Chinese,  are  practically  the  weakest,  while  the 
most  non-traditional  people,  the  Americans, 
are  to-day  the  best  fitted  for  modern  life. 


140 


National  traditions,  of  course,  cannot  be 
cast  away  over  night.  In  the  Diaspora  old  and 
genuine  Jewish  traditions  were  the  life-giver  of 
our  people.  They  were  the  main  force  that 
preserved  us  from  annihilation,  as  long  as 
we  were  facing  the  problem,  "How  can  we  best 
preserve  our  national  existence?"  To-day,  how- 
ever, we  are  not  only  facing  the  problem  of 
preserving  our  national  existence,  but  also 
that  of  rebuilding  our  nation  and  reorganizing 
our  people  so  as  to  make  its  future  safe.  Since 
the  entire  Jewish,  problem  has  changed  so 
radically,  our  attitude  to  the  complex  Jew- 
ish traditions  must  change.  We  cannot  pos- 
sibly use  the  same  methods  in  rebuilding  our 
national  existence  as  in  preserving  our  nation. 
The  two  different  problems  need  two  different 
positions.  Just  as  China  is  a  terrifying  ex- 
ample of  what  slavery  to  tradition  can  do  to  a 
nation,  so  is  America  an  edifying  example  of 
what  traditions  can  do  in  strengthening  a 
nation.  A  nation  does  not  live  to  uphold  tra- 
ditions only;  and  where,  instead  of  helping  a 
nation,  traditions  handicap  it,  they  will  be 
superceded  by  new  traditions  to  be  created  by 
national  deeds. 

We  do  not  want  to  describe  our  future  life 


Ul 


in  Palestine,  for  we  are  today  unable  to  do  so. 
We  are  only  anxious  to  lay  stress  upon  the 
fact  that  what  we  have  called  our  traditions  in 
Diaspora  life  will  probably  have  to  be  revised 
in  a  Jewish  Palestine.  Life  is  much  stronger 
than  the  Book  and  the  principle  derived  from 
the  Book.  In  the  Diaspora  it  was  the  principle 
of  the  Book  that  shaped  our  life,  because  it 
helped  to  preserve  it.  In  Palestine,  where 
there  wall  be  an  active  Jewish  life,  Jewish  life 
itself  must  work  out  its  own  principles.  This 
is  what  we  should  bear  in  mind,  whether  we 
are  orthodox  or  free-thinkers.  We  must  go 
to  Palestine  with  the  consciousness  of  freedom 
and  not  with  the  feeling  that  we  are  the 
creatures  of  traditions.  We  will  have  to  free 
ourselves  not  only  from  many  Roman  tra- 
ditions that  was  most  worthy  in  the  Diaspora, 
but  will  be  superfluous  in  Palestine. 

The  future  Jewish  State  in  Palestine  will 
draw  its  strength  from  Jewish  life  and  not 
from  principles  of  the  Book;  it  will  be  free 
from  all  inorganic  traditions  which  we  have 
acquired  during  our  long  life  in  the  Diaspora, 
and  from  those  traditions  which  were  un- 
Jewish  in  nature. 


142 


WHAT  IS  THE  JEWISH  MISSION? 

IN  view  of  the  rise  of  Jewish  nationalism 
during  the  last  decade,  especially  duriuo; 
the  war,  it  is  understandable  why  the  fancy  of 
the  Jewish  masses  should  be  directed  to  the 
future  of  the  Jewish  State  in  Palestine  and 
that  quite  premature  questions  as  to  the  form 
and  character  of  the  Jewish  State  should  be 
asked. 

There  are  no  prophets  nowadays.  No  serious- 
minded  man  would  even  dare  to  anticipate  the 
development  of  many  generations  and  attempt 
to  foresee  the  character  of  the  time  which  is 
deeply  enshrouded  in  the  bosom  of  the  future. 
Sociology  has  not  yet  discovered  laws  with  the 
help  of  which  one  can  predict  future  material 
happenings.  Nevertheless,  serious-minded 
Jews,  especially  nationalists,  should  give  a 
thought  to  the  question  of  possible  future  de- 
velopments and  should  ask  themselves  in  which 
direction  they  have  decided  to  go. 

An  unequivocal  answer  to  this  question  will 
help  to  clarify  matters  and  will  deprive  the 


143 


enemy  of  many  of  the  weapons  which  he  is 
always  ready  to  use  against  us. 

When  Theodor  Herzl  appeared  before  the 
Zionist  Congress  in  1906  with  his  famous 
Uganda  proposition,  the  Jewish  people  was 
amazed.  How  could  a  man  like  Theodor 
Herzl,  whose  love  for  Palestine  was  beyond 
doubt,  propose  to  the  Jews  to  settle  in  East 
Africa,  on  a  stretch  of  territory  not  only  out- 
side the  pale  of  Jewish  traditions  but  even 
outside  the  pale  of  civilization?  If  it  had 
been  a  question  only  of  enabling  the  then  badly 
persecuted  Russian  Jews  to  emigrate  to  other 
countries  where  they  could  live  in  relative 
freedom  and  happiness,  were  there  not  plenty 
of  civilized  countries  where  the  Jews  could  find 
a  refuge?  These  and  similar  questions  were 
raised  after  Herzl  brought  forth  the  Uganda 
proposal.  But  those  who  were  on  intimate 
terms  with  the  great  leader  later  explained 
this  apparently  strange  mood. 

It  was  in  1903  that  von  Plehve  began  his 
policy  of  pogroms,  and  from  1903  to  1906  hun- 
dreds of  pogroms  were  perpetrated  against  the 
Jews  in  Russia  and  Poland.  Theodor  Herzl, 
who  witnessed  the  development  of  the  tragic 
Dreyfus  affair  and  who  had  some  experience 


144 


with  western  European  anti-Semitism,  knew 
perfectly  well  the  prevailing  hatred  against 
the  Jews  everywhere,  but  he  could  not  imagine 
that  a  Christian  State,  forming  a  member  of 
the  family  of  nations,  should  in  the  twentieth 
century  resort  to  such  barbarities  as  pogroms, 
in  order  to  carry  out  its  anti-Semitic  policy. 
Man  of  delicate  and  fine  feelings  as  he  was,  he 
became  so  disgusted  with  the  situation  and  so 
downhearted  on  account  of  these  pogroms 
that,  in  a  moment  of  despair,  he  said  to  him- 
self, "We  would  rather  live  among  the  Hotten- 
tots and  other  savages  in  Africa  than  among 
the  civilized  Christian  nations  in  Europe." 
The  entire  Uganda  proposition  can  be  under- 
stood as  an  expression  of  disgust  with  Euro- 
pean civilization  on  the  part  of  our  great 
Jewish  statesman  and  artist.  In  short,  Uganda 
was  a  loud  protest  against  Christian  civiliza.- 
tion  and  Christian  political  methods. 

In  a  lesser  degree  Zionism,  also,  is  partly  a 
protest  against  European  Christian  civiliza- 
tion, which  is  an  inheritance  of  ancient  Rome. 
We  want  to  go  back  to  Palestine  not  only  be- 
cause we  want  to  live  a  national  life  of  our  own 
there,  but  also  because  we  are  utterly  repelled 
by  European  civilization  and  because  we  do 


145 


not  believe  in  a  civilization  that  leads  to  the 
murder  and  pillage  of  entire  nations  and  the 
reign  of  horror  and  brutal  might.  We  are  dis- 
gusted with  this  civilization  because  we  do  not 
believe  that  "might  is  right/'  because  we  do 
not  believe  in  the  political  heritage  of  ancient 
Kome. 

We  cannot  say  whether  or  not  every  nation- 
alistic Jew  is  conscious  of  this  fact,  but  the 
conscientious  historian  who  does  not  believe 
in  the  inheritance  of  Kome  will  certainly 
ascribe  the  revival  of  Jewish  nationalism  not 
only  to  the  national  memories  of  the  Jews,  but 
also  to  the  radical  difference  between  Jewish 
and  Eoman  political  ideas  and  ideals  and  to 
the  difference  in  the  concept  of  life  of  the  Jew 
and  those  who  live  on  the  political  inheritance 
of  ancient  Kome.  We,  for  one,  firmly  believe 
that  Zionism,  in  spite  of  its  purely  political 
aspects,  has  the  ethical  consciousness  of  the 
Jewish  nation  as  its  basis  and  as  its  driving 
power ;  Zionism  is  thus  to  our  mind  not  only  a 
political,  but  also  an  ethical  movement — or 
even  a  revolutionary  movement,  in  the  sense 
that  the  Jewish  people  revolts  against  a  system 
of  civilization  from  which  not  only  entire 
humanity  has  suffered,  but  from  which  it  has 


146 


suffered  most.  Now,  since  Zionism  is  also  an 
ethical  movement,  one  can  easily  see  to  wliat 
its  realization  should  lead. 

Though  the  Jewish  people  lived  in  a  Europe 
dominated  by  Roman  ideas  for  two  thousand 
years,  it  did  not  become  an  adherent  of  the 
Roman  school  of  thought.  We  have  remained 
Jews,  still  cherishing  Jewish  ideals  of  justi(-e 
and  equity,  and  we  mean  to  go  back  to  Pales- 
tine not  as  ^^Europeans,''  but  as  Jews  pure  and 
simple.  It  cannot  possibly  be  our  desire  to 
erect  in  Palestine  such  a  system  of  civilization 
and  to  establish  there  such  an  order  of  things 
as  have  created  the  present  state  of  affairs  in 
Europe.  We  are  going  to  Palestine  not  only 
to  begin  a  new  national  life,  hut  also  to  create 
a  new  system,  of  civilization.  This  is  the  justi- 
fication of  Zionism  from  a  broad  ethical  point 
of  view.  We  are  going  to  realize  there  not  the 
old  Roman  inheritance  but  the  old  Jewish  in- 
heritance. We  have  for  the  last  2,500  years 
had  a  political  philosophy  of  our  own,  a  polit- 
ical philosophy  that  is  just  the  opposite  of  the 
Roman  political  philosophy.  We  believe  that 
the  political  philosophy  of  the  old  prophets  is 
just  as  human  and  at  least  as  near  to  reality 
as    the   political   philosophy    of   the    ancient 


147 


Eomans,  and  we  believe  that  our  national 
political  philosophy,  which  considers  men  not 
only  as  physical  beings  but  also  intellectual 
and  spiritual  beings  and  urges  them  to  live 
up  to  their  spiritual  and  intellectual  nature, 
is  at  least  as  sound  as  the  one-sided  Roman 
political  philosophy,  which  takes  into  account 
only  the  physical  nature  of  man  and  hence 
teaches  that  "might  is  right/' 

It  is  our  firm  conviction  that  Jewish  national 
ideals  of  old,  though  buried  in  books  for  the 
last  two  thousand  years,  can  be  turned  into 
reality  and  be  applied  to  life.  This  is  what  we 
are  going  to  do  in  Palestine.  But,  people  will 
ask,  if  the  Jewish  ideals  are  based  on  life's 
reality,  why  did  not  the  Jewish  people  succeed 
in  making  its  ideals  a  force  in  life  when  it 
lived  on  its  own  soil  and  enjoyed  independ- 
ence? To  this  we  reply  that  the  ancient  Jew- 
ish genius,  which  devised  such  grand  plans  of 
life,  failed,  for  reasons  which  we  cannot  enu- 
merate here,  to  create  the  technique  and 
methods,  with  the  help  of  which  these  grand 
plans  could  have  been  carried  out.  The 
Romans,  on  the  other  hand,  invented  a  won- 
derful technique  of  life,  but  failed  to  devise  a 
plan  of  life  which  would  make  life  more  worth 


148 


living  than  it  is  now.  We  have  lived  under  the 
system  of  Koman  civilization  for  nearly  two 
thousand  years.  We  have  not  been  imbued 
with  Eoman  ideals.  We  have  not  accepted  the 
Koman  doctrine  of  life,  but  we  have  learned  a 
great  deal  from  Roman  technique,  and  we  are 
therefore  now  equipped  with  both — with  the 
Jewish  idealistic  traditions  and  with  the  ex- 
periences of  Roman  civilization  and  Roman 
technique.  Now  we  are  in  a  position  to  apply 
our  ideals  of  old  to  life,  because  we  possess  the 
methods  and  the  technique  of  the  application. 
We  know  today  a  great  deal  about  administra- 
tive and  constitutional  technique,  of  which  our 
ancestors  knew  next  to  nothing.  We  know 
today  a  great  deal  about  organization,  of 
which  our  ancestors  had  not  the  slightest  idea. 
Having  gone  through  the  Roman  school,  we 
to  day  know  something  about  organization  and 
this  knowledge  of  organization  we  are  going  to 
apply  to  our  political  traditions,  to  our  philos- 
ophy of  life;  w^e  are  going  to  create  in  Pales- 
tine that  synthesis  of  civilization  which  will  be 
Jewish  to  the  core  in  its  contents  and  Roman 
in  shape  and  form.  Might  will  not  be  right, 
because  man  is  not  only  a  physical  but  also  an 
intellectual  and  spiritual  being.     Justice  and 


U9 


equity  will  be  thoroughly  organized  and  will 
not  be  left  to  the  conscience  of  the  idealistic 
individual  only,  as  was  the  case  in  ancient 
Judea. 

Whether  the  future  Jewish  State  in  Pales- 
tine will  be  a  republic  or  a  monarchy  does  not 
matter.  The  form  of  government  never  testi- 
fies to  the  soundness  of  the  state;  there  are 
good  monarchies  and  bad  republics.  One 
thing  is  as  clear  as  day :  If  there  is  going  to 
be  a  Jewish  Palestine,  it  will  be  a  land  of 
justice  an^  freedom,  where  right  will  prevail 
and  where  the  demands  of  the  spirit  will  be 
complied  with.  All  forms  of  life  will  have 
to  be  different  from  what  they  are  in  the  pale 
of  Koman  civilization.  ^^Thou  shalt  be  a  light 
unto  the  nations."    This  must  be  our  ambition. 

Jews  as  individuals  can  accomplish  very 
little  for  Judaism,  cannot  help  to  realize  its 
ideals  and  cannot  possibly  make  it  a  force  in 
life.  For  two  thousand  years  we  have  lived  in 
the  Diaspora  as  individuals,  and  what  did  we 
accomplish  for  the  realization  of  our  old  ideals, 
of  which  we  are  so  proud?  Nothing.  Only 
feeble-minded  rabbis,  who  are  constantly  talk- 
ing of  the  mission  of  Judaism  without  know- 
ing what  they  are  talking  about,  can  speak 


150 


of  the  mission  of  the  Jews  in  the  face  of  the 
present  catastrophe.  Jews  as  individuals  can- 
not have  any  Jewish  mission  in  life,  but  a 
people  can,  if  it  is  inspired  by  ideals. 

What  we  have  failed  to  do  as  individuals 
for  two  thousand  years — to  make  humanity 
recognize  that  the  political  philosophy  of  the 
old  prophets  is  much  stronger  than  that  of  the 
old  Romans — we  may  be  able  to  realize  in 
Palestine  as  a  people.  It  is  only  with  reluct- 
ance that  we  use  the  much  abused  phrase, 
^^ Jewish  mission,"  but  if  there  is  such  a  thing 
as  the  Jewish  mission,  it  will  only  be  realized 
when  the  Jews  are  reorganized  as  a  people  on 
the  soil  of  their  ancestors  and  lead  such  a  life 
as  to  justify  the  prediction  of  the  prophet  of 
old :  "Thou  shalt  be  a  light  unto  the  nations." 
This  is  the  true  meaning  of  the  Jewish  mission. 
This  and  nothing  else. 


Princeton  Theological  Seminary-Speer 


1    1012  01010  8837 


I 


